这
T H E
创意工厂
IDEA FACTORY
这
T H E
创意
工厂
IDEA
FACTORY
在麻省理工学院学习思考
LEARNING TO THINK
AT MIT
胡椒白
PEPPER WHITE
谨以此书献给我的母亲和我的父亲的怀念。
This book is dedicated to my mother and to the memory of my father.
致谢
Acknowledgments
在这本书首次出版之前，许多人都给予我帮助和鼓励。他们当中有 John Mattill、Liz Muther、Linda Simon、Aklilu Gebrewold、Carl Brandt、Bill Newlin、Bill Ijams，还有 Putnam 的一位匿名编辑，他在一封拒绝信中告诉我，如果我想出版这本书，就找一位文学经纪人。
Many people helped and encouraged me along the way to the first publication of this book. Among them were John Mattill, Liz Muther, Linda Simon, Aklilu Gebrewold, Carl Brandt, Bill Newlin, Bill Ijams, and the anonymous editor at Putnam who, in a rejection letter, told me to find a literary agent if I ever wanted to publish this book.
还要感谢审阅原版部分内容的麻省理工学院的教授和朋友；特别感谢 Elias P. Gyftopoulos 教授允许我们使用他的课程笔记和教科书“热力学：基础和应用”（Macmillan，1991）中的材料以及他的修改。
Thanks also to the MIT professors and friends who reviewed sections of the original version; special thanks to Professor Elias P. Gyftopoulos for permission to use material from his course notes and textbook "Thermodynamics: Foundations and Applications" (Macmillan, 1991), and for his corrections.
非常感谢我的文学经纪人马拉加·巴尔迪 (Malaga Baldi)。还要感谢已故的我的第一位编辑亚历克西亚·多尔辛斯基 (Alexia Dorszynski)，她告诉我不要自我审查，而且她也没有审查我。
Many thanks to Malaga Baldi, my literary agent. And thanks to the late Alexia Dorszynski, my first editor, who told me not to censor myself and who did not censor me.
感谢麻省理工学院出版社主编 Larry Cohen，1984 年冬天，他是我向其提交原始手稿的第一个人。当时他的鼓励帮助我坚持了下来，我很感激现在有机会将这本书重新付印。
Thanks to Larry Cohen, Editor-in-Chief at The MIT Press, who in the winter of 1984 was the first person to whom I submitted a primitive manuscript. His encouragement at that time helped me persist, and I appreciate the present opportunity to return the book to print.
最后，衷心感谢我的妻子伊丽莎白·罗斯·怀特 (Elizabeth Ross White)，她的评论极大地改进了本版的新内容。
Finally, warm thanks to my wife, Elizabeth Ross White, whose review comments greatly improved the new material in this edition.
内容
C O N T E N T S
麻省理工学院出版社版前言xiii
Preface to the MIT Press Edition xiii
序言1
Prologue 1
2.第17 类
2. Class 17
3. 突破30
3. Break 30
4. 期中考试45
4. Midterm 45
5. 资金60
5. Funding 60
6. 总决赛69
6. Finals 69
7. 行会78
7. The Guild 78
8. 监工93
9. 春季108
9. Spring 108
10. 控制119
10. In Control 119
11. 西格玛德尔塔134
11. Sigma Delta 134
12. 二七十145
12. Two Seventy 145
13. 自杀无痛吗？ 163
14.永动机174
16. 爸爸闪电203
16. Papa Flash 203
17. 六人的欢乐215
18. 结果230
18. Results 230
19. 不，不是250
19. No It Isn't 250
20. 质量控制260
21.继续教育277
章节注释287
Chapter Notes 287
索引309
Index 309
我们难道不能弥合造成心灵内乱的鸿沟吗？双方的极端分子都说，不行！诗人和有信仰的人都肯定，只有通过人的精神，通过直觉理解，他才能接触到真正的现实。那些头脑更清醒的人会把这种态度抛在一边，认为它是无望的神秘主义，非理性和虚假的。大多数人无法决定选择哪条路，并试图过双重生活。与科学对话的海德与艺术、政治或宗教的杰基尔是不同的人。许多人认为这种分裂的忠诚是不可避免的。……但这种二元性很难为任何令人满意的生活哲学提供坚实的基础。在最好的情况下，它是令人沮丧的，在最坏的情况下，它是危险的……
Can we not bridge the chasm which thus makes for civil strife within the mind? The extremists on both sides say, no! The poet and the man of faith affirm that only through man's spirit, through intuitive understanding, can he touch true reality. Those who have harder heads will toss this attitude aside as hopeless mysticism, irrational and false. Most men cannot decide on either course, and attempt to live a double life. The Hyde who holds discourse with science is a different man from the Jekyll of art or politics or religion. This divided allegiance is accepted as inevitable by many. ... But such duality can hardly offer a sound basis for any satisfying life philosophy. At best it is demoralizing, at worst, perilous....
-摘自爱德华·W·辛诺特的《科学与整个人类》，耶鲁大学谢菲尔德科学学院百年校庆演讲，1947 年 10 月
-From Edward W. Sinnott, "Science and the Whole Man," centennial address, Sheffield Scientific School, Yale University, October 1947
麻省理工学院出版社版前言
Preface to the MIT
Press Edition
“这本书不够严厉。”——麻省理工学院博士，哈佛大学医学博士（1999 年）
"The book wasn't harsh enough."-an MIT Ph.D. who is also a Harvard M.D. (1999)
“我读过这本书，这就是我想来麻省理工学院的原因。”——麻省理工学院的一名本科生将这本书列为必读书目（1996 年）
"I read it and that's why I wanted to come to MIT."-an undergraduate in an MIT course that included this book as required reading (1996)
“那本书在会议上不断被提起。”——一位麻省理工学院教授（1993 年）
"That book keeps coming up at meetings."-an MIT professor (1993)
“如果你想知道为什么我没有给麻省理工学院捐款，请读佩珀·怀特的书。”——一位在麻省理工学院读研究生的富有的潜在捐赠者（1992 年）
"If you want to see why I haven't given any money to MIT, read Pepper White's book."-a wealthy potential donor to MIT who went there for graduate school (1992)
“这是我读过的最悲伤的书。”——麻省理工学院合作社的一名销售员（1991 年）
"It's the saddest book I've ever read."-a sales clerk at the MIT Cooperative Society (1991)
我于 1984 年获得麻省理工学院 (MIT) 的硕士学位。本书第一版出版于 1991 年。麻省理工学院出版社版本于 2001 年出版。
I received my master's degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1984. The first edition of this book was published in 1991. The MIT Press edition appears in 2001.
萨尔曼·拉什迪曾说，书会选择作者。我的父亲是一位科学作家，毕业于哈佛大学工程专业，二战后为范尼瓦尔·布什工作。我的母亲是一位天才钢琴家，她教会了我音乐的精神层面。在约翰霍普金斯大学，我接受了文科工程本科教育，包括艺术史、电影、外语，以及个人发展的时间和机会。
Salman Rushdie said that books choose their authors. My father was a science writer, a Harvard-educated engineering major who after World War II worked for Vannevar Bush. My mother is a gifted pianist who has educated me about the spiritual dimension of music. At Johns Hopkins I had a liberal arts engineering undergraduate education, including art history, cinema, foreign languages, and time and opportunity to develop as a person.
一次文书错误让我通过“技术与政策”项目的后门被麻省理工学院录取。一次慷慨的举动让我获得了一份带薪研究助理职位，并找到了一位真正的天才作为我的论文导师。一次意外的缺席让我在本科生宿舍住了两年。沃伦·罗森诺教授要求我除了修读研究生课程外，还修读本科机械工程的核心课程。一只无形的手引导我走过了学院的深渊和高峰。
A clerical error led to my being accepted to MIT, through the back door of the "Technology and Policy" program. A generous act led me to a paid research assistantship and a veritable genius as my thesis advisor. An unplanned absence placed me for two years in an undergraduate dormitory. And Professor Warren Rohsenow required me to take the core undergraduate mechanical engineering curriculum in addition to my graduate courses. An invisible hand led me through the depths and heights of the Institute.
1988 年，我父亲去世后不久，我在他的私人文件里发现了爱德华·W·辛诺特的引文，摘录自前一页，以及地址的其他摘录。我把它带回了家。一年后，当我试图发现这本书的内容时，我掸掉了泛黄的洋葱皮纸复写纸上的灰尘，感觉起了一身鸡皮疙瘩。这是我父亲送给我的礼物。理性与表现主义。辩证唯物主义——前苏联的国家哲学——和宗教。正题与反题。稗子和麦子。
Shortly after my father passed away in 1988, I found among his personal papers the Edward W. Sinnott quotation from a prior page, as well as other excerpts of the address. I took it home with me. When attempting a year later to discover what this book was to be about I dusted off the yellowing onion-skin-papered carbon copy and felt goose bumps. It was a gift from my father. The rational and the expressionistic. Dialectical materialism-the state philosophy of the former Soviet Union-and religion. Thesis and antithesis. The tares and the wheat.
在第一版出版十年后再回顾这本书，我认为它回答了三个问题，第一个问题是，去麻省理工学院学习到底是什么感觉？
Looking at the book ten years after its first edition, I see it as answering three questions, the first of which is, What is it really like to go to MIT?
第二，学会思考意味着什么？我遇到的第一位教授告诉我，我在麻省理工学院学到什么并不重要，重要的是教会我“如何思考”。成为一名工程师需要经过哪些小步骤？工程师如何学会解决问题？在这个过程中，他或她如何维持人际关系和友谊？
Second, What does it mean to learn to think? The first professor I met told me that it didn't really matter what I learned there, but that MIT would teach me "how to think." What are the small steps that cumulatively form an engineer? How does an engineer learn to solve problems? How does he or she maintain relationships and friendships during the process?
最后，机械思维的局限性是什么？它会导致孤立、孤独、倦怠和不充实的生活吗？它能为宗教、灵感和精神留下空间吗？
Finally, What are the limits of mechanistic thinking? Does it lead to isolation, loneliness, burnout, and an unfulfilling life? Can it leave room for the religious, the inspirational, the spiritual?
在过去的半个世纪里，人们一直在讨论第三个问题。辛诺特演讲几年后，CP·斯诺在剑桥大学发表了题为“两种文化”的演讲。20 世纪 50 年代，当麻省理工学院开始着手将两种文化联系起来时，阿德莱·史蒂文森据说曾说过，麻省理工学院试图将科学家人性化，而哈佛大学则试图将人文主义者西蒙化。（对于年轻的读者，我赶紧解释说，“西蒙化”是一种清洁和抛光汽车的服务。）就在 2000 年 10 月 21 日，《波士顿环球报》在头版刊登了一篇题为“将技术人员变成人文主义者”的文章，副标题是“学校塑造整个工程师”。
This third question has been much discussed in the last halfcentury. Several years after the Sinnott address, C. P. Snow delivered a lecture entitled "The Two Cultures" at the University of Cambridge. In the 1950s, when MIT was embarking on an early effort to bridge the two cultures, Adlai Stevenson is reported to have said that MIT was trying to humanize the scientists, while Harvard was trying to Simonize the humanists. (For younger readers I hasten to explain that "Simonize" was a service that cleaned and polished cars.) As recently as October 21, 2000, the Boston Globe had a front page article entitled "Turning techs into humanists," with the subhead "Schools shaping the whole engineer."
1981 年至 1984 年期间，我在麻省理工学院学习。1984 年春天，我通过安排每周与《技术评论》前主编约翰·马蒂尔 (John Mattill) 会面，撰写了本书的初稿，当时我的大部分经历还记忆犹新。1989 年夏天，我与达顿 (Dutton) 签订了合同，并于 1991 年秋天首次出版。
I was at MIT between 1981 and 1984. I wrote a first draft of the book by scheduling weekly meetings with John Mattill, former editor of Technology Review, during the spring of 1984, while much of the experience was still fresh in my memory. In the summer of 1989 it went under contract with Dutton, and it was first published in the fall of 1991.
这些事件发生已近 20 年，但每当我在报纸上读到有关麻省理工学院的文章时，我都会对自己说“这符合我的心意”。我曾遇到并写过关于酗酒、新生宿舍空间不足、女性待遇不佳、自杀等问题。麻省理工学院曾试图纠正这些问题。而且，它的一些努力可能取得了成功。
The events occurred nearly 20 years ago, but whenever I read an article in the newspaper about MIT, I say to myself "that's in my book." I encountered and wrote about binge drinking, the lack of sufficient dorm space for freshmen, the poor treatment of women, suicide. The Institute has tried to correct these problems. And it may have been successful in some of its efforts.
1996 年春天，当我给麻省理工学院的本科生们做演讲时，许多人都说，他们认为这次经历并不像我在书中描述的那么艰难。这可能意味着，麻省理工学院因为这本书而发生了一些变化。
When I gave a talk to a class of MIT undergrads in the spring of 1996, many of them said that they didn't think the experience was as hard as I had described in the book. Which may mean that the Institute has changed somewhat because of the book.
但正如本书的一位人物所说，“麻省理工学院是一条我必须杀死的恶龙。”麻省理工学院占地数百英亩，聚集了全世界一万名最聪明、最勤奋的人，而他们则受到一千名更聪明的教授的驱使。将学院建设成一个更加温和、更加亲切的地方，这种温情脉脉的软性要求必然要让位于真正的事业，即发明、发现和获得高技能。
But as one of this book's characters says, "MIT is a dragon I have to slay." Ten thousand of the smartest, hardest-working people in the world are placed together within the several hundred acres of the MIT campus, and they are driven by 1,000 even smarter professors. The touchy-feely soft stuff of making the Institute a kinder gentler place will of necessity always take a back seat to the real business of inventing, discovering, and becoming highly skilled.
我在麻省理工学院失去了一位朋友，他自杀了。我嘲笑这种灾难中过度技术化的态度，因为我首先想到的是死亡的流体力学。然而，麻省理工学院的创新杂志写道，“用公平的统计学眼光看待这些数字[最近的自杀数据]”，你会发现这只是一个随机波动，就像棒球击球手的低迷或连胜一样。告诉父母、兄弟、姐妹、男朋友、女朋友、丈夫、妻子、室友、同班同学。休·古斯特森是我在飞机上遇到的一位人类学家，他在俄克拉荷马城爆炸案发生当天在劳伦斯利弗莫尔国家实验室，他说，武器科学家听到这个消息后，立即拿出计算器，忙着估算炸弹的爆炸能量。
I lost a friend to suicide at MIT. I mock the over-techie attitude toward such calamities, when my first thought is the fluid mechanics of the decease. Yet MIT's magazine of innovation writes, "take a fair, statistical look at these numbers [recent suicide data]" and you find that it's just a random fluctuation, like a baseball batter's slump or streak. Tell that to the parents, the brothers, the sisters, the boyfriends, the girlfriends, the husbands, the wives, the roommates, the hallmates. Hugh Gusterson, an anthropologist whom I met on an airplane and who was at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory on the day of the Oklahoma City bombing, said that the weapons scientists, on hearing the news, immediately pulled out their calculators and busied themselves with estimating the explosive energy of the bomb.
这本书的另一个主题是：从失败中幸存下来。麻省理工学院的一万名学生中，许多人经常失败。本科生不及格，或者成绩达不到研究生院的录取标准。研究生无法完成学业。新博士无法获得博士后或助理教授职位。助理教授没有晋升。麻省理工学院和其他类似机构必须保持其标准，但他们如何才能在这样做的同时更加人性化呢？
There is another theme of the book: surviving failure. Many of the Institute's ten thousand students fail on a regular basis. An undergraduate flunks out, or doesn't have the grades to be admitted to graduate school. A graduate student doesn't complete his or her degree. A newly minted Ph.D. doesn't get the postdoc or assistant professorship. The assistant professor is not promoted. MIT and other places like it have to maintain their standards, but how can they be more humane while doing that?
几年前，我遇到一个刚被数学研究生项目开除的孩子。他很沮丧，因为他根本没有学位。他和麻省理工学院的其他人可能会浪费一生的时间思考自己不够好，而塔夫茨大学可能会让他们成为院长。这些人的悲伤辅导在哪里？正如《一个男人》中查理·克罗克被抛弃的妻子玛莎所说，“你变成了隐形人。”
Several years ago I met a kid who had just been kicked out of the mathematics graduate program. He was crushed; he had no degree at all. He and others at MIT may spend a lot of their lives wasting time thinking they're just not good enough, when Tufts would probably make them deans. Where's the grief counseling for these people? As Martha, Charlie Croker's cast-off wife in A Man in Full says, "you become invisible."
如果您在麻省理工学院或类似机构遇到危机，请考虑休假、转学、在杂货店工作一段时间等。情况会好转的。在我参加约翰霍普金斯大学 20 周年聚会期间，我与一位大一同学交谈过，他在大二、大三和大四期间转学到了一所名气稍小的学校。我一直不知道他当时的转学情况，但他现在的职业生涯非常精彩。
If you the reader are in a crisis at MIT or a similar place, consider the option of taking time off, transferring to another school, working at a grocery store for a while, whatever. Things will get better. During my 20th reunion at Johns Hopkins, I spoke with a classmate from freshman year who transferred to a slightly less prestigious school for his sophomore, junior, and senior years. I've never found out what the circumstances of that transfer were, but he is now enjoying a wonderful career.
在冰暴期间未能登顶珠穆朗玛峰并不是什么丢人的事。
There is no shame in not summitting Mount Everest during an ice storm.
关于这本书本身，我有几个注释。这本书主要是非虚构的，因为书中大部分内容都是基于我在麻省理工学院读研究生时最美好的回忆。但是，我没有接上声音，也没有拍下书中描述的所有地点的照片。因此，例如，在 Mikic 教授的椅子上堆放的期刊文章实际上可能是在 Rohsenow 教授的椅子上或其他人椅子上。
A few notes about the book itself. It is primarily nonfiction, since most of what happens in it is based on my best recollections of experiences I had as a graduate student at MIT. However, I was not wired for sound and I did not take photographs of all the locations described herein. Thus for example the journal articles described in piles on Professor Mikic's chairs may have been, in fact, on Professor Rohsenow's chairs or on someone else's chairs.
保留了麻省理工学院主要教授的名字，这既是为了充分肯定他们在我参加的讲座中所作的工作，也是为了介绍真正的麻省理工学院的真人。这些人物的对话或讲座材料通常用引号括起来。然而，这本书是在八年后写的，我所呈现的文字是基于我的记忆和/或当时做的笔记。如果我的记忆有误，我深表歉意。那些使用真名的人都包含在本书的索引中。
Names of key MIT professors have been retained, both to give due credit to the work they presented in the lectures I attended, and to present real people in the real Institute. Dialogue or lecture material for these characters is often included in quotation marks. However, the book was written eight years after the fact, and the words I present are based on my memory and/or notes I took at the time. If my memory is at fault, I apologize. Those people whose real names are used are included in the book's index.
其余角色均为虚构人物，名字和体貌特征均已更改，且这些角色的少数场景纯属虚构。不过，即便是虚构场景，也基于真实经历。
All other characters are composites; the names and physical characteristics have been changed, and a few of the scenes with these characters are purely fictitious. However, even the fictitious scenes are based on real experiences.
第 21 章是本版新增的。其他所有文本与原版完全相同，但有一些更正。正文包括要解决的技术问题的一般概念以及我解决这些问题的方法；章节注释包括对技术材料的更多讨论。
Chapter 21 is new to this edition. All other text is exactly as it appeared in the original edition, with a few corrections. The main text includes the general sense of the technical problems to be solved and my approaches to them; the Chapter Notes include more discussion of the technical material.
当我看到一张 20 世纪 50 年代麻省理工学院的照片时，我突然想到了这本书的名字。照片向北望去，越过 20 号楼和游泳池。背景是几栋红砖工厂建筑。照片的标题是“麻省理工学院和工厂”，由麻省理工学院技术员弗雷德·罗斯伯里 (Fred Roseberry) 制作。“就是这样，”我想。麻省理工学院是一个工厂，一个创意工厂，一个创意工厂。
The book's title came to me when I saw a print of what MIT looked like in the 1950s. The view was looking north, past Building 20 and the swimming pool. In the background were several red brick factory buildings. The title of the print was "MIT and Factories," and it was produced by Fred Roseberry, an MIT technician. "That's it," I thought. MIT is a factory, a factory for ideas, an idea factory.
麻省理工学院另类学生报纸《蓟花报》对这本书的评论指出，“创意工厂”一词是在二战后创造的。它就是战后研究型大学应有的样子：一所附近有附属产业的大学。就像斯坦福大学和硅谷。或者麻省理工学院和肯德尔广场/128 号公路。
The review of this book in The Thistle, MIT's alternative student newspaper, noted that the term "idea factory" had been coined after World War II. It was what the postwar research university should be: a university with affiliated industry nearby. As in Stanford and Silicon Valley. Or MIT and Kendall Square/Route 128.
我很高兴我去了麻省理工学院。我在那里学到的严谨让我受益匪浅。我花了一些时间与伟人为伍。麻省理工学院确实让我变得更聪明——这意味着任何人都可以通过学习思考变得更聪明。
I'm glad I went to MIT. The rigor I learned there has served me well. I spent some time in the company of greatness. And MIT really did make me smarter-which means that anyone can become smarter, by learning to think.
对于每个去麻省理工学院的人来说，麻省理工学院都是一个不同的地方。但是存在着不变的因素，我希望在下文中我已经提到了不止几个。
MIT is a different place for everyone who goes there. But there exist invariants, and I hope I've hit on more than a few in what follows.
序幕
Prologue
比利时
Belgium
1981 年 5 月 9 日，星期六
Saturday, May 9, 1981
信在我的口袋里变得湿漉漉的，皱巴巴的。我陷入了沉思。
The letter was getting wet and wrinkled in my pocket. I was thinking.
离开斯蒂芬妮，去麻省理工学院。娶斯蒂芬妮，留在比利时。用海洋阻隔我和斯蒂芬妮，去麻省理工学院。以后娶斯蒂芬妮，去麻省理工学院。
Leave Stephanie; go to MIT. Marry Stephanie; stay in Belgium. Put ocean between me and Stephanie; go to MIT. Marry Stephanie later; go to MIT.
“亲爱的怀特先生，”信中写道。“我们还没有收到您的来信，我们想知道我们是否应该为您在明年秋季的技术和政策计划小组中预留一个位置。请尽快告知我们您的决定。”
"Dear Mr. White," the letter said. "We have not yet heard from you and would like to know if we should reserve a place for you in next fall's group for the Technology and Policy Program. Please let us know your decision at your earliest convenience."
这是他们的第一封信，这毫无意义。当你被录取时，你通常会收到一份厚厚的包裹，里面有住房和保险表格。还有资金。
This was their first letter and it didn't make sense. When you're accepted, you usually get a fat package with forms for housing and insurance. And funding.
今晚提出问题；周一给麻省理工学院打电话。
Pop question tonight; call MIT Monday.
1794 年，农民们忍无可忍，在法国大革命期间，他们烧毁了修道院，只留下了烟囱和现在在树林中沉寂的柱子。烟囱被剥开，收缩，长满青苔的灰色石头向上缓缓变窄。
The peasants had had enough in 1794 and, during the French Revolution, they burned the abbey, all except the chimney and the columns now dormant amidst the trees. Peeled open, the chimney converged, the moss-covered gray stone narrowing gently upward.
它看上去就像一个竖立的风洞，就像冯·卡门流体力学研究所的风洞一样，这个研究所是位于布鲁塞尔南部的北约中心，我之前八个月一直在那里学习。我很好奇是哪个和尚想出了烟囱的通风会因汇聚而得到改善的想法。
It looked like a wind-tunnel stood on its end, like the wind tunnels at the von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics, the NATO center just south of Brussels where I'd been studying for the previous eight months. I wondered which monk had come up with the idea that the chimney's draft would be improved by the convergence.
这座修道院名为维莱尔-拉-维尔（位于热纳普以南五公里处 [滑铁卢以南十二公里处（布鲁塞尔以南十四公里处）]），始建于十二世纪。导游走过烟囱，指着残破的食堂墙上的长方形石通道。“你认为这是做什么用的，”他用法语问道，“？”
The abbey, named Villers-la-Ville (five kilometers south of Genappe [twelve kilometers south of Waterloo (fourteen kilometers south of Brussels)]), dated from the twelfth century. The guide passed the chimney and pointed to the rectangular stone passage in the wall of the ruined refectory. "And what," he asked in French, "do you think this was for?"
我回答说：“用烟在进入烟囱之前加热房间。”
I answered, "To heat the room with the smoke before it went to the chimney."
“啊，是的，”他回答道，“先生肯定是一位工程师。”
"Ah, oui, eh," he replied, "Monsieur must be un ingenieur."
那天晚上，斯蒂芬妮坐在布鲁塞尔路易斯广场附近的罗宾汉餐馆里，对面坐着我。
Stephanie sat across from me that night in the Robin Hood Restaurant near Brussels's Place Louise.
当我告诉她麻省理工学院录取了我时，她说：“哦，我为你感到高兴。”但她那双孩子般棕色眼睛里的神情却很悲伤，就像约翰·列侬去世时让我爱上她的那种悲伤一样。
"Oh," she said when I told her MIT had accepted me, "I'm very happy for you." But the look in her childlike brown eyes was sad, sad the same way that had made me fall in love with her when John Lennon died.
我不能伤她的心。
I couldn't break her heart.
“你是想和我结婚吗？”我用法语问她。
"Is it that you would like me to marry?" I asked her in French.
她说：“那是‘你愿意和我结婚吗？’”我帮助她学习英语，她帮助我学习法语。
She said, "That's 'Would you like to marry yourself with me?' " I helped her with her English; she helped me with my French.
“好的。你愿意和我结婚吗？”
"OK. Would you like to marry yourself with me?"
“是的。”
"Oui."
哦天啊，这是怎么回事？
Oh mon Dieu, qu'est ce que j'ai fait?
5 月 11 日，星期一
Monday, May 11
“请稍等。”国际接线员说道。
"Hold the line please," the international operator said.
“你好，TPP，”4,000 英里外传来女人欢快的声音。
"Hello, TPP," said the woman's cheery voice from 4,000 miles away.
“呃，是的，”我说，“我是佩珀·怀特，打电话来询问你寄给我的信的事。”
"Uh, yeah," I said. "This is Pepper White calling about the letter you sent me."
“哦，天哪，”她说，“我不知道该怎么告诉你，但我们犯了一个大错误。你的文件被错误地放在了延期录取档案柜里，而它本来应该被放在延期申请档案柜里。所以你实际上没有被录取。”
"Oh, gee," she said. "I don't know how to tell you this, but we made a big mistake here. Your file was put in the deferred acceptances filing cabinet by mistake, and it was supposed to be put in the deferred applications file. So you're not really admitted."
“那是不是意味着我被拒绝了？”
"Does that mean I'm rejected?"
“不，这意味着你的档案不完整。你还需要两封推荐信。”
"No, it means your file isn't complete. You need two more letters of recommendation."
“我会看看我能做什么。”
"I'll see what I can do."
布鲁塞尔机场
Brussels Airport
1981 年 8 月 29 日
August 29, 1981
“我也爱你……一定要写信……圣诞节见……我会想念你的……”
"I love you, too.... Be sure to write.... I'll see you at Christmas. ... I'll miss you...."
同一天到达科德角上空
Above Cape Cod, Same Day
飞行员开始下降太晚了。飞机急剧下坠。
The pilot started the descent too late. Steeply downward the plane dropped.
我想冲进驾驶舱，叫醒飞行员，然后说：“拉回操纵杆，你这个白痴；拉回操纵杆！”
I wanted to break into the cockpit, wake up the pilot, and say, "Pull back on the stick, you idiot; pull back on the stick!"
章节
C H A P T E R
1
1
登录中
Logging On
1981 年 8 月 31 日，星期一
Monday, August 31, 1981
我从肯德尔广场地铁站爬上楼梯，拐过街角来到艾姆斯街，开始感到胃里有些打结。也许我还是应该留在比利时。这条街的右边是一家古老的灰色工厂，左边是一栋单调的红砖建筑。工厂的窗户半开着，压缩空气发出嘶嘶声，机器在金属上打洞的声音很大。
I climbed the stairs from the Kendall Square subway stop, rounded the corner onto Ames Street, and began to feel the knot being tied in my stomach. Maybe I should have stayed in Belgium after all. The street was bounded by an old gray factory on the right and a drably functional red brick building on the left. The factory windows were half-open, and compressed air hissed and machines loudly punched holes in metal.
我记得达罗莎女士给我高中同学放映的麻省理工学院物理电影中的休姆先生和艾德先生。她拒绝给我写推荐信，理由是那不是人类的推荐信。她说，等一下，去一所不错的文理学院读大学。努力学习，取得好成绩，如果你还想去，就去麻省理工学院读研究生。
I remembered Mr. Hume and Mr. Ide in the physics movies from MIT that Mrs. DaRosa had shown my high school class. She had refused to write me a recommendation to MIT for college on the grounds that it wasn't human. Wait, she said, and go to a nice liberal arts school for college. Work hard, get good grades, and if you still want to, go to MIT for graduate school.
我去了约翰霍普金斯大学。在那里，我主修环境工程，学习了艺术史、法国、意大利、美国电影。我参加了一次大旅行。前六个月在米兰及其周边地区，然后一年在冯·卡门研究所。我感到很放松，仿佛我人生的广阔篇章已经完成。现在是时候集中精力工作了。
I went to Johns Hopkins. There, as I majored in environmental engineering, I studied art history, French, Italian, American cinema. I went on the Grand Tour. First six months in Milan and the environs, then my year at the von Karman Institute. I felt rested, as if the broadening chapter of my life had been completed. Now it was time to focus and to work.
我从工厂出来后右转，穿过工厂和一栋不那么单调的米色混凝土和玻璃建筑，一直走到一个拐角处。再往前走，是包豪斯风格的游泳池和二战时期的临时建筑。我感到幽闭恐惧，但又感到安全。比利时修道院的窗户也朝内。修道院为受过专业训练的精英提供了时间和空间，让他们可以静下心来思考。我将成为现在的精英中的一员：知识分子的一员。
I turned right after the factory and went between it and the not-quite-as-drab beige concrete and glass building that came to a point. Farther along were the Bauhaus-style box of a swimming pool and temporary World War II buildings. I felt claustrophobic and yet protected. The windows at the Belgian monastery had faced inward also. The monastery had provided time and space for quiet reflection by a devotedly trained elite. I would become one of that present elite: a member of the intelligentsia.
我第一次听说麻省理工学院是在北卡罗来纳州达勒姆市杜克大学的附近。出差回家后，我父亲给我带来了一本《麻省理工学院纸飞机大全》。我最喜欢的是那本看起来像一架小型直升机的书，当我放手时，它就会旋转着落到地面上。我十一岁时，我的母亲（钢琴家）、父亲、三个姐姐和我搬到了华盛顿特区。他在美国国家科学院找到了一份科学作家的工作。
I first heard of MIT growing up in the shadow of Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. Coming home from a business trip, my father brought me The Great MIT Paper Airplane Bookmy favorite was the one that looked like a little helicopter and twirled down to the ground when I let it go. When I was eleven, my mother (a pianist), my father, my three older sisters, and I moved to Washington, D.C. He'd taken a job as a science writer with the National Academy of Sciences.
第一次世界地球日（1971 年，我十三岁）激发了我对环境的兴趣。这种兴趣一直没有得到重视，直到我正考虑申请哪所大学时，我才看到约翰霍普金斯大学提供环境工程学位。我从该系开始，然后转到物理系，再转回来，并对节能作为保护环境的一种方式产生了兴趣。麻省理工学院的技术和政策项目 (TPP) 为这类问题提供了一种通才方法；他们接受了我，所以我就进入了这里。
It was the first Earth Day (in 1971, I was thirteen) that sparked my interest in the environment. That interest lay dormant until I was trying to figure out where to apply for college and I saw that Johns Hopkins offered an Environmental Engineering degree. I started in that department, jumped over to physics, jumped back, and became interested in energy conservation as a way to help the environment. MIT's Technology and Policy Program (TPP) offered a generalist's approach to that type of issue; they accepted me and here I was.
在相邻的回廊里，混凝土和沥青之间的一小块草地上，一支后备军官训练团小队正在进行晨间跳跃运动。
On a small patch of grass between concrete and asphalt in the adjoining cloister an ROTC squad did their morning jumping jacks.
停下来！”领头的人命令道。
And halt!" the leader ordered.
“我们有动力吗？”他喊道。
"Are we MOtivated?" he shouted.
“是的，先生！”他们大声说道。
"Yes, sir!" they breathed loudly.
“我们真的有极大的动力吗？”他问道。
"Are we Extreeeeeernly motivated?" he asked.
“是的，先生！”他们再次松了一口气。
"Yes, sir!" they breathed again.
“下跌 20。”
"Down for 20."
我钦佩他们的热情。我不知道自己是否也能达到他们的水平。
I admired their intensity. I wondered whether I'd ever be able to match it.
“这是麻省理工学院的怀特医生，”我想象着我的客户这样介绍我。“他收费很高，但他医术高超……而且速度很快。”
"This is Doctor White from MIT," I imagined my clients introducing me. "He's expensive, but he's good ... and he's fast."
我向指挥官询问如何去 TPP 办公室 1-138。
I asked the commander how to get to the TPP office, 1-138.
“在那栋楼左转——那是 13 号楼；然后回到无尽走廊，右转进入 6 号楼。从 7 号楼大厅左转第二个路口就是 1 号楼；1-138 应该在去查尔斯酒店的半路上。放心！”他说话很快，好像他的舌头跟不上他的大脑。我想象着四分之一英里内有成千上万个像他这样的人。
"Turn left at that building up there-that's Building 13; then go back up to the infinite corridor and turn right into Building 6. Your second left from Building 7 lobby is Building 1; 1-138 should be about halfway to the Charles. At ease!" He spoke quickly, as if his tongue could not quite keep up with his brain. I imagined thousands like him within a quarter-mile.
“无限走廊是什么？”我问。
"What's the infinite corridor?" I asked.
“它连接所有主要建筑，两端都有玻璃门，长约 319 步。11 月 12 日和 1 月 31 日，阳光从它的一端直射到另一端。”
"It links all the main buildings, has glass doors on either end, and is about 319 paces long. On November 12 and January 31 the sun shines directly from one end of it to the other."
我找到了那条无尽的走廊，尽管学校还没有上课，但行人的行走速度几乎与慢跑无异。所有人的目光都注视着前方。有些人向朋友或熟人点头致意，但没有人停下来聊天。
I found the infinite corridor and even though school was not yet in session the pedestrian cruising speed was just short of a jog. All eyes were fixed forward. Some nodded to friends or acquaintances but none stopped to chat.
我心里一阵揪紧。这种空虚的恐惧感和小时候等着校车去参加夏令营第一天时一样笼罩着我。
There was a tug on the knot in my stomach. It was the same empty terror that had gripped me as a child waiting for the bus to take me to the first day of day camp.
我有几分钟的空闲时间，所以我在两边走来走去，欣赏麻省理工学院过去伟大人物的展品。万尼瓦尔·布什，计算机之父。诺伯特·维纳，11 岁高中毕业，另一位计算机之父，也是飞机自动驾驶仪等现代控制设备理论的创始人。卡尔·泰勒·康普顿，本世纪早期的著名物理学家，也是麻省理工学院的校长。已故大师们的黑白照片中都闪烁着智慧的光芒。
I had a few minutes to kill, so I wandered from side to side, admiring the displays of past MIT greats. Vannevar Bush, a father of computers. Norbert Wiener, high school graduate at eleven, another father of computers and of modem theory of controlling devices like airplane automatic pilots. Karl Taylor Compton, noted physicist from earlier in the century, who was also president of MIT. Intelligence sparkled through the eyes of all the old blackand-whites of the late great masters.
这些展览的目的肯定是为了激励当代人努力工作，效仿他们的祖先。但这些墙壁似乎首先告诉我的是“无论你多么努力，你永远都无法像这些巨人一样。他们不仅什么都不做，只是工作；而且他们很有天赋。”
The displays must be meant to inspire the present generation to work hard, to emulate their ancestors. But the first thing these walls seemed to tell me was "No matter how hard you work, you'll never be like these giants. Not only did they do nothing but work; they were gifted."
外面潮湿难耐，基里安庭院的树木郁郁葱葱。海绵在潮湿的空气中蒸腾。8:30，我独自一人在技术和政策办公室附近等候。
Outside it was heavily humid, the trees in Killian Court lushly green. Sponges transpiring into the heavy air. I waited near the Technology and Policy Office, alone at 8:30.
里面又冷又暗。我透过走廊的窗户望向查尔斯河对岸后湾区的天际线。
It was cool and dark inside. I looked through the corridor window across the Charles to the skyline of Back Bay.
几分钟后，布朗大学的吉姆·斯图尔特 (Jim Stuart) 来了。他来这里是为了挑选办公桌。办公桌相当于麻省理工学院的图书馆阅览室，是你可以安全存放书籍的家外之家。像我一样，吉姆也来这里排队领取资助。如果你没有资助，至少你应该有一张办公桌。这是我的第一个朋友。
After a few minutes, a guy from Brown named Jim Stuart arrived. He was there to get the pick of the desks. An office desk is the MIT equivalent of a library carrel, a home away from home where you can securely keep your books. Like me, Jim was also there to get in line for funding. If you don't have funding at least you should have a desk. My first friend.
“你在霍普金斯大学主修什么专业？”他问道。
"What was your major at Hopkins?" he asked.
“环境工程，”我说，“你知道，废水处理、垃圾填埋、污染控制。你呢？你主修什么？”
"Environmental engineering," I said. "You know, wastewater treatment, landfills, pollution control. How about you? What'd you major in?"
“环境科学。有点类似的问题，但可能涉及更多的化学成分。”
"Environmental sciences. Sort of the same kind of issues, but maybe with a little more chemistry."
他口齿伶俐，眼神中流露出常春藤盟校的睿智。他选择了 TPP，而不是哈佛肯尼迪学院，后者是另一个官僚培训基地。在交谈中，我开始怀疑我们是否都被理查德·德·诺伊维尔教授的利他主义所欺骗。这位“机场专家”的计算机程序优化了机场飞机交通流量，让他声名大噪，以至于他可以启动一个项目，培训人们掌握双语：既会说技术语言，又会说英语。
He was articulate and had an Ivy League knowing look in his eyes. He'd picked TPP over Harvard's Kennedy School, another training ground for bureaucrats. As we talked, I began to wonder whether we had both been duped by the altruism of Professor Richard de Neufville, the "airport guy," whose computer programs for optimizing the flow of airplane traffic at airports had made his name big enough that he could start a program to train people to be bilingual: to speak the language of technology and to speak English.
我不知道我们是不是被一个看上去不错的项目骗了。但是，根据宣传册，毕业生在智库和大型咨询公司担任了重要职位，他们是“与众不同的工程师”。
I wondered whether we'd been fooled into a program that looked good only on paper. But, according to the brochure, the graduates went on to impressive positions at think tanks and highpowered consulting firms, and they were "engineers with a difference."
凯伦·史密斯，来自大洋彼岸的那位欢快的声音打开了办公室的门。新英格兰的生活让她的南方口音变得平淡而压抑，但她的魅力却没有消失。
Karen Smith, the cheery voice from across the ocean, unlocked the office. Life in New England had flattened and compressed her southern accent but not her charm.
“所以，我想你们都需要学生办公室的钥匙，”她说。“它在 20 号楼那边；穿过 13 号楼，右转，然后进入 26 号楼的下面。这是一张剩余办公桌的图表。”
"So I guess y'all need keys to the student office," she said. "It's over in Building 20; you go through Building 13, take a right, and go under Building 26. Here's a chart of the desks that are left."
表格上的 20 个桌子中，只有 5 个没人认领，总共有 15 个人报名参加。我和吉姆很早就到了，这很好。
Of the twenty desks on the chart, only about 5 were unclaimed, and there were fifteen people entering the program. Jim and I had done well to be early.
“德·诺维尔教授今天在吗？”吉姆问道。“我想和他谈谈资金问题。”
"Is Professor de Neufville in today?" Jim asked. "I wanted to talk to him about funding."
“是的，我也想去。”我说。
"Yeah, I'd like to, too," I said.
她回答说：“他今年正在休假。但这是一份项目清单。你也可以和斯隆管理学院或你所在工程系的人谈谈。”
She answered, "He's on sabbatical for the year. But here's a list of projects. You can also talk to people at the Sloan School of Management or in your base engineering department."
每位技术与政策专业的学生都必须隶属于一个工程系。我的隶属关系是机械工程系；我想加强我的流体力学和环境背景。此外，我想凭借麻省理工学院的学位，从强势的角度来讨论环境和能源问题。
Each technology and policy student had to be affiliated with an engineering department. My affiliation was with mechanical engineering; I wanted to strengthen my fluid mechanics and environmental background. Also, I wanted to argue environmental and energy issues from a position of strength, with a degree from MIT.
“哦，我差点忘了，”卡伦说，“学期开始前你要参加三场考试。写作考试在星期四；无需修读本科课程即可获得研究生经济学课程资格的考试在下星期二；游泳考试你可以随时参加。不会游泳的人不可能获得麻省理工学院的学位。这是你的课程目录。”
"Oh, I almost forgot," Karen said. "You'll have three tests before the term begins. The writing test is on Thursday; the test to qualify for the graduate economics course without taking an undergraduate course is next Tuesday; and you can take the swimming test whenever you want. No one can get a degree from MIT without knowing how to swim. And here're your course catalogs."
我和吉姆走回 20 号楼，这是游泳池对面的二战临时建筑。三层，灰色，军用风格。TPP 学生办公室在三楼。
Jim and I walked back to Building 20, the World War II temporary building opposite the swimming pool. Three stories, gray, military. The TPP student office was on the third floor.
房间里铺着橙色的地毯，墙壁是米色的，沙发是棕色的。管道裸露在外；灯是荧光灯。角落里有一块电炉和一台冰箱。这就是家。
It had orange carpet, beige walls, and a brown couch. Pipes were exposed; lights were fluorescent. There were a hot plate and a refrigerator in the corner. This was home.
当我们走进来时，一个看起来像印度人的男人正在打电话，结束了谈话并进行了自我介绍。
The Indian-looking guy talking on the phone when we walked in finished his conversation and introduced himself.
“我叫阿姆里特（Amrit），你叫什么名字？”
"My name's Amrit; what's yours?"
吉姆和我分别告诉了他这件事，当吉姆寻找空闲的办公桌时，我继续和阿姆里特交谈。
Jim and I each told him and while Jim was scoping out the free desks, I continued to talk to Amrit.
“你来这里研究什么？”阿姆里特问道。
"What are you here to study?" Amrit asked.
“节约能源。我想研究能源系统来帮助对抗温室效应。”
"Energy conservation. I want to work on energy systems to help combat the greenhouse effect."
“哦，是的，”他说。“我也在研究能源。我刚刚为我的祖国巴基斯坦完成了一个能源模型。我喜欢能源。能源很简单。”
"Oh yes," he said. "I'm working on energy, too. I've just finished an energy model for my home country of Pakistan. I like energy. Energy is easy."
对，我想。什么是模型？我不能问他，因为我不想显得愚蠢。他的说话方式表明他很聪明，但他认为能源很容易，这让我很不安。我来这里不是为了学习空谈；我来这里是为了学习严谨，学习如何通过良好的工程和经济分析来节约能源。阿姆里特很友好，但我不禁想到，如果他想做简单的事情，他会在日内瓦或纽约的联合国找到一份轻松的工作，不为国家做任何事情，而是依靠麻省理工学院的文凭。
Right, I thought. What's a model? I couldn't ask him because I didn't want to sound dumb. His way of speaking indicated that he was bright, but it disturbed me that he thought that energy was easy. I didn't come here to learn fluff; I came to learn rigor, to learn how to save energy through good engineering and economic analysis. Amrit was friendly, but I couldn't help thinking that if he wanted to work on easy things he would land a cushy job at the UN in Geneva or New York, doing nothing for his country and riding on the coattails of his MIT credential.
吉姆找了一个靠窗的座位，我则选了离电话最近的座位。很快就到了微笑着拨打电话申请资金的时间了。
Jim found a window seat, and I picked the one nearest the phone. It would soon be time to smile and dial for funding.
但首先，我要浏览一下课程目录。它和波士顿电话簿一样厚。我翻阅了一下，找到了 TPP 中吸引我的部分。“技术与政策项目培养‘与众不同的工程师’。通过对工程、经济学、系统分析和监管政策的广泛研究，毕业生将能够在技术和政策环境中发挥作用。”两年前，这听起来很棒，但令我困扰的是，该项目没有任何资金。真正的工程部门可以从财富 500 强公司或各种政府机构募集资金。但没有通用部门，所以 TPP 几乎没有机会。如果没有人资助研究生研究，那么我毕业后谁来资助我的薪水？此外，冯·卡门研究所让我走上了一条硬核方向；TPP 可能太软了。我向 Amrit 征求建议。
But first a look through the course catalog. It was as thick as the Boston phone book. I thumbed through it and found the section that had appealed to me about TPP. "The Technology and Policy Program produces 'engineers with a difference.' Through study of a broad mix of engineering, economics, systems analysis, and regulatory policy, graduates will be able to function in the technological and policy environments." It had sounded great two years back, but it bothered me that there wasn't any funding for its projects. Real engineering departments could solicit funding from Fortune 500 companies or from various government agencies. But there was no Department of Generalities, so TPP had few doors to knock on. If there wasn't anyone to fund graduate research, who would fund my paycheck when I finished? Besides, the von Karman Institute had started me in a hard-core direction; TPP might be too soft. I asked Amrit for advice.
“那么TPP真的能培养出与众不同的工程师吗？”我问他。
"So is it true that TPP produces engineers with a difference?" I asked him.
“是的，”他说，“不同之处在于他们找不到工作。”我的疑虑越来越深。我继续浏览目录。
"Yes," he said. "The difference is that they can't get jobs." My doubts were intensifying. I continued to look through the catalog.
和 7-Eleven 一样，麻省理工学院也有自由选择的权利。院系会指定你必须修读的课程数量，但修读哪门课程则由你、你的导师和院系研究生导师共同决定。
As at Seven-Eleven, there is freedom of choice at MIT. The departments specify the number of courses you have to take, but which you take is between you, your adviser, and the department graduate adviser.
麻省理工学院的每个系都有一个编号，每门课程也是如此。它可以帮助您在目录中找到方向。机械工程是“课程 2”。子学科用下一个数字表示。流体力学是 20 系列，热力学是 40 系列，传热学是 50 系列。我记下了潜在的课程。
Every MIT department has a number, as does every course. It helps you find your way through the catalog. Mechanical Engineering is "Course 2." The subdisciplines are signified by the next digit. Fluid mechanics is the 20 series, thermodynamics the 40 series, and heat transfer the 50 series. I noted potential courses.
2.25 高级流体力学（A. Shapiro、K. Gemayel）。“概述流体动力学的主要概念和方法。静力学。连续流体的连续性、动量和能量关系。涡旋动力学。循环。流体流动中的动态相似性。边界层理论，包括分离和剪切流现象的其他例子。湍流简介。阻力。升力。”未来几个月的潜在隐喻。
2.25 Advanced Fluid Mechanics (A. Shapiro, K. Gemayel). "Surveys principal concepts and methods of fluid dynamics. Statics. Continuity, momentum, and energy relations for continuous fluids. Vorticity dynamics. Circulation. Dynamical similarity in fluid flows. Boundary layer theory, including separation and other examples of shear flow phenomena. Introduction to turbulence. Drag. Lift." Potential metaphors for the coming months.
2.451 通用热力学 I（先决条件：教师许可）（EP Gyftopoulos）。“适用于小型和大型系统以及平衡和非平衡状态的热力学一般基础。状态、属性、功、能量、熵、热力学势以及除功以外的相互作用（非功、热、质量转移）的定义。应用于材料属性、整体流动、能量转换、化学平衡、燃烧和工业制造。”我觉得这听起来应该有助于我的节能技能。也许 Gyftopoulos 也有资金。我给它打了一颗星。
2.451 General Thermodynamics I (Prerequisite: Permission of Instructor) (E. P. Gyftopoulos). "General foundations of thermodynamics valid for small and large systems, and equilibrium and nonequilibrium states. Definitions of state, property, work, energy, entropy, thermodynamic potential, and interactions other than work (nonwork, heat, mass transfer). Applications to properties of materials, bulk flow, energy conversion, chemical equilibrium, combustion, and industrial manufacturing." Sounds like this one should help my energy conservation skills, I thought. Maybe Gyftopoulos has funding, too. I put a star by it.
2.55 高级传热学 (W. Rohsenow)。“在强制和浮力驱动的流动中，发展了热量、动量和质量传递之间的相似性。涵盖了传热的基本模式：扩散、内部和外部强制和自然对流、沸腾、冷凝和辐射传热。流动不稳定性以及传热增强技术。将传热结果扩展到类似的对流传质过程。”这可以帮助设计热交换器以回收化学过程中的废热，或设计太阳能集热器。我也给它打了一颗星。
2.55 Advanced Heat Transfer (W. Rohsenow). "Develops similarity between heat, momentum, and mass transfer in forced and buoyancy-driven flows. Covers fundamental modes of heat trans fer: diffusion, internal and external forced and natural convection, boiling, condensation, and radiative heat transfer. Flow instabilities and heat transfer augmentation techniques. Extends heat transfer results to analogous convective mass transfer processes." This could help in designing a heat exchanger to recycle waste heat from a chemical process, or in designing a solar collector. I put a star by it, too.
自从我划独木舟以来，我就对流体产生了兴趣，那时湖中央的波浪、风和雨看起来既混乱又有序。我想看到并感受到秩序。我第一次体验热传递是在小时候，当时我煮了一个煮熟的鸡蛋。煮了二十分钟后，我往鸡蛋上倒了水。鸡蛋冷却了一秒钟，然后又变热了。为什么呢？
Fluids had interested me since my canoe tripping days, when the waves and wind and rain in the middle of the lake seemed at once chaotic and orderly. I wanted to see, to feel the order. My first heat transfer experience was as a child with a hard-boiled egg. After it had boiled for twenty minutes, I poured water over it. It cooled down for a second, then heated up again. Why?
“我要去拿我的运动卡并参加游泳测试，”吉姆说。“你们俩谁想来吗？”
"I'm gonna go get my athletic card and take the swimming test," Jim said. "Either of you guys want to come?"
“哦，是的，”阿姆里特说。“我 9:30 和朋友迪利普要打壁球。我很乐意和你一起过去。”
"Oh, yes," Amrit said. "I've got a squash game with my friend Dilip at 9:30. I'd be happy to walk over there with you."
“我想我会在这里待一会儿，”我说。“我想开始联系凯伦给我们的项目名单上的人员。”
"I think I'll hang out here," I said. "I want to start contacting the people on the project list Karen gave us."
微笑着拨打电话。第一学期的学费是 3,700 美元。如果我需要六个学期（包括暑假）才能毕业，而且学费会上涨，比如说通货膨胀率加上 3 个百分点，如果我找不到某个“金主”来支付我的学费，我得欠多少钱？哦，别忘了每年还要支付 5,000 美元左右的生活费。这不像医学院、商学院或法学院，我毕业后能赚 60K 多，一两年内就能还清所有债务。我从父母和三个朋友那里借来的 1,000 美元，利率为 15%，这是我能承受的最大债务。
Smile and dial. Tuition for the first term is $3,700. If it takes me six terms counting summers to get out of here, and tuition goes up at, say the inflation rate plus 3 points, how much will I owe if I don't find some sugar daddy to pay my way through? Oh, and don't forget living expenses at another $5,000 or so a year. And it's not like med school or B school or law school where I'll be making 60K + when I get out of here and can pay off any debts in a year or two. The $1,000 I borrowed at 15 percent from my parents and each of three friends is as much debt as I ever want to bear.
大大的笑容。感受嘴角在脸上延伸。深呼吸。拿起电话。
Big smile. Feel the corners of that mouth extend across the face. Deep breath. Pick up the phone.
“你好，米基克教授在吗？”
"Hello, is Professor Mikic there?"
“这很像米克，”电话那头的斯拉夫语声音说道。“我能为您做些什么？”
"That's Mick-ish," the Slavic voice on the other end said. "What can I do for you?"
“呃，我的名字是佩珀·怀特，我在技术和政策项目工作，我看到你有一个相变材料研究项目。我想知道我是否可以过来和你谈谈。”我的膝盖在发抖。
"Uh, my name is, uh, Pepper White, and I'm in the, uh, Technology and Policy Program, and I saw that you, uh, have a research project in phase change materials. I was wondering whether I, uh, could come and talk to you about it." My knees were shaking.
“你不会愿意在我身上浪费时间的，”他说。“我没钱。”
"You don't want to waste your time with me," he said. "I don't have any money."
“也许我可以和你谈谈我的课程。我想我需要一些指导。”
"Maybe I could talk to you about my classes. I think I need some guidance."
“如你所愿。十一点怎么样？”
"As you wish. How's eleven o'clock?"
“听起来不错。谢谢您，先生。”
"That sounds fine. Thank you, sir."
第二个电话。“罗伯特·平代克教授，经济学系（斯隆管理学院）。论文项目：全球石油定价的计算机建模。确定供需曲线、汇编计量经济数据和敏感性分析。兼职研究助理。”
Call number two. "Professor Robert Pyndike, Economics Department (Sloan School). Thesis project: Computer modeling of global oil pricing. Determination of supply and demand curves, compilation of econometric data, and sensitivity analysis. Half-time research assistantship."
听起来不错。也许我会这么做，然后去为 OPEC 酋长工作，年薪 10 万美元。OPEC 在维也纳。我喜欢维也纳。
It sounded good. Maybe I'll do that and go work for an OPEC sheik for $100K. OPEC's in Vienna. I like Vienna.
“您好，平代克教授，我想和您预约一个时间，聊聊您的石油定价研究。”
"Hello, Professor Pyndike, I'd like to make an appointment to talk to you about your oil pricing research."
“和我的秘书谈谈并预约吧。我会在下周二之前外出。”
"Talk to my secretary and make an appointment. I'll be out until next Tuesday."
“好，谢谢。”
"OK. Thanks."
“Leon Glicksman 教授。泡沫冰箱隔热材料中氟利昂排气的实验和理论研究。开发计算机模型来预测实验结果、构建测试设备并完善模型。”
"Professor Leon Glicksman. Experimental and theoretical study of outgassing of freon in foam refrigerator insulation. Development of computer models to predict experimental results, construction of test apparatus, and refinement of models."
他的答录机说他下周二回来。铃声响后我就没再留言。
His answering machine said he'd be back next Tuesday. I didn't leave a message after the tone.
Mikic 的办公室在 3 号楼。穿过大厅，我停下来看看展示柜，里面贴着照片，还有一些用燕麦盒、橡皮筋和绳子做的东西。一定是某种比赛。
Mikic's office was in Building 3. Across the hall I stopped to look at the display case with photos posted and things made out of oatmeal boxes, rubber bands, and string. Must have been some kind of contest.
他的办公室很有教授风范。办公桌旁边的桌子上堆满了期刊论文。他座位对面是一块黑板。他身后是一整面墙的书架。他的窗户俯瞰着基里安庭院潮湿的树林。他的年轻助手穿着运动短裤和 T 恤，和我差不多大，正在黑板旁边的电脑终端上打字。
His office was professorly. Piles of journal articles on the table next to his desk. A blackboard opposite where he sat. A wall of full bookcases behind him. His window overlooked the humid trees of Killian Court. His young assistant, about my age in gym shorts and a T-shirt, was typing at a computer terminal near the blackboard.
米基克给我提供了一张麻省理工学院的黑色船长椅，就是校友们在书房里放的那种，上面没有堆放期刊论文。论文堆得很整齐。我觉得我可以问他任何有关传热学的问题，他都能从合适的堆里抽出合适的文章。
Mikic offered me one of the black MIT captain's chairs, the kind that alumni have in their dens, the one that didn't have a stack of journal articles on it. The piles were neat. I had the feeling that I could ask him about anything in heat transfer and he could go to the right pile and pull just the right article out of the middle of it.
他大约五十岁，身材苗条，头发稀疏，穿着一件白色短袖纽扣衬衫，没有打领带。最上面的纽扣没有扣上。他脸上挂着友好而睿智的微笑。
He was about fifty, trim, with most of his hair, wearing a white short-sleeve button-down shirt, no tie. The top button was unbuttoned. He had a friendly, intelligent smile.
“那么，先生，我能为您做些什么……”
"So, what can I do for you, Mr...."
“怀特。我在比利时做过一些相变材料方面的工作，所以我认为那段经验可能对你的项目有用。”
"White. I did some work on phase change materials in Belgium, so I thought that experience might be useful for your project."
“嗯，很抱歉，但我已经把这个项目交给那边的那个家伙了。”终端机前的那个家伙看起来很聪明，打字很快。我也想在导师的办公室里显得很聪明，打字很快。
"Well, I'm sorry, but I already have given that project to that fellow sitting over there." The guy at the terminal was looking smart, typing fast. I wanted to look smart and type fast in my mentor's office, too.
米基奇问道：“离开这里之后你想做什么？”
Mikic asked, "What do you want to do when you get out of here?"
“我想成为一名能源专家。”
"I want to be an energy expert."
“嗯，那很好。这是一个很好的话题。不过要小心。当你完成学业时，油价可能会跌回每桶 15 美元，每个人都会忘记节能。你在这里学什么并不重要。我们教你思考。我们把你培养成专业人士。然后你就可以做任何你想做的事了。”
"Well, that's very good. That's a good topic now. Be careful, though. When you finish oil might be back down to $15 a barrel and everyone will forget about energy conservation. It doesn't really matter what you study here. We teach you to think. We make you into a professional. Then you can do whatever you want."
“你能帮我挑选一下这学期的课程吗？我已经标记了一些我感兴趣的课程，比如流体、热学和传热学。我打算这学期选修五六门课程，包括一些 TPP 课程，因为我还没有资金。这样我就能领先一步了。”
"Could you help me pick out my classes for the term? I've starred some that look interesting to me, like fluids, thermo, and heat transfer. I was thinking about taking five or six this term including some TPP courses since I don't have funding yet. Then I'll be ahead of the game."
“先从五门开始，然后减两门，”他轻快地说道。“一定要确保在真正的工程课程中取得 A 的成绩。我们大多数人都不太看重软政策方面的 A。我们聘用那些能在硬课程中取得好成绩的人。”
"Start with five, then drop two," he said briskly. "And make sure you get A's in the real engineering classes. Most of us don't give much credit to A's in that soft policy stuff. We hire people who can make it in the hard courses."
米基奇继续说道：“你知道，你来这里时身无分文，这是一件非常勇敢的事情。25 年前我也做过同样的事情。我飞到这里，只剩下一个学期的钱和一张回南斯拉夫的机票。如果我没能在第一学期完成学业，那我就只能‘回到铁托那里’了。在第一个学期，我比大多数人都更努力，我的所有课程都获得了 A 的成绩。现在我是一名终身教授。谁知道呢？也许你也会遇到同样的情况。”
Mikic continued, "You know it's a courageous thing you're doing, coming here without any money. I did the same thing twenty-five years ago. I flew here and had money for one term and a plane ticket home to Yugoslavia. If I didn't make it in the first semester it would have been 'back home to Tito.' I worked harder than most in that first term, and I got A's in all my classes. Now I'm a tenured professor. Who knows? Maybe the same will happen to you."
“我希望如此，”我起身离开时说道。
"I hope so," I said as I rose to leave.
“祝你好运。如果你需要任何帮助，请过来。”
"Good luck now. If you ever need any help, please drop by."
如果说米基克是学术界，那么吉夫托普洛斯就是产业界。我需要他的许可才能选修通用热力学 I。他的办公桌和椅子都是柚木的；中间放着一张纸，左边放着一小叠信件。他打电话的时候，我瞥了一眼从接待处拿到的 Thermo Electron 年度报告。净收入 1700 万美元，销售额 2.7 亿美元。在董事照片那一页，吉夫托普洛斯有一张护照大小的照片，看上去睿智而富有。在麻省理工学院的智力马拉松中，他是金牌得主。
If Mikic was academe, Gyftopoulos was industry. I needed his permission to take General Thermodynamics I. His desk and chairs were teak; a single pad of paper was on the center and a small stack of correspondence to his left. While he was on the phone I glanced at the annual report from Thermo Electron that I had picked up from the reception area. Net revenues of $17 million on $270 million in sales. On the page where the directors were pictured, Gyftopoulos had a passport-size photo, looking wise and wealthy. In the mental marathon that is MIT, he was a gold medalist.
吉夫托普罗斯快六十岁了，有点超重，但他保持得很好。他的头发灰白，发际线后移，离秃顶还差得远。他的衬衫没有口袋，但左胸上有一个整齐的 EPG 字母组合。他抽着一支从便笺簿旁边的银色烟盒里拿出来的香烟。
Gyftopoulos was pushing sixty, a little overweight but he carried it well. He had salt-and-pepper gray hair and a receding hairline that had stopped well short of baldness. His shirt had no pockets, but on the left chest was a neatly monogrammed E.P.G. He smoked a cigarette he had taken from the silver cigarette case next to the pad.
“先生，我想上您的普通热力学课，”我说。
"I'd like to take your general thermodynamics class, sir," I said.
“没问题。”他的口音听起来像是跟雅典的英国人学的英语。“你在热力学方面有什么背景？”
"That's fine." His accent sounded like he'd learned English from a Brit in Athens. "What kind of background do you have in thermodynamics?"
“嗯，我在霍普金斯大学选修了施瓦茨教授的课程，而且我还选修了几门涉及该领域的流体力学和热质传递课程。”
"Well, I took a course at Hopkins with Professor Schwarz, and I've also taken several fluid mechanics and heat and mass transfer classes that touch on it."
“你那些课都得了A吗？”他直接问道。
"Did you get A's in those classes?" he asked directly.
“是的，我参加了。我非常想上你的课。我对热力学中的能量守恒方面特别感兴趣。”
"Yes, I did. I'd really like to take your class. I'm especially interested in the energy conservation aspects of thermodynamics."
“您有节能方面的背景知识吗？”
"Do you have any background in energy conservation?"
“我在意大利时对一家工厂进行了节能研究。我发现，如果他们付钱雇人去修理压缩空气系统的泄漏，他们每年可以节省 25,000 美元。”
"I did an energy conservation study of a factory while I was in Italy. I found that if they would pay a guy to go around and fix the leaks in the compressed air system they could save $25,000 per year."
“这很有意思，”他回答道，“你指出他们必须付钱给这个人才能实现节约，这一点很好。资本、劳动力和能源总是有权衡的。欢迎你报名参加这门课程。我期待在第一堂课上见到你。”
"That's very interesting," he answered, "and it's good that you noted that they would have to pay the guy to achieve the savings. There is always a trade-off of capital, labor, and energy. You're welcome to register for the course. I shall look forward to seeing you at the first lecture."
得到他的认可让我感觉很好。
It felt good to have his approval.
“谢谢您，先生。有什么书可以让我提前了解这些内容吗？”
"Thank you, sir. Is there any book I can read to get a head start on the material?"
“不，你最好等到第一节课再看。到时候我们会发课堂笔记。吉安·保罗·贝雷塔和我正在研究一篇课文，我们相信它不会犯热力学课文中常见的错误。如果你读任何其他材料，也许它会让你感到困惑。”
"No, it's best that you wait until the first class. We will be handing out course notes then. Gian Paolo Beretta and I are working on a text that we believe will not make the mistakes that are commonly found in thermodynamics texts. If you read any other material perhaps it might confuse you."
周五，TPP 新生见面会在 1 号楼二楼的休息室 Miller Room 举行。我终于在同一个地方见到了所有其他学生。他们都足够聪明，但大多数人似乎缺乏我所期望的 MIT 人的专注力和方向感。不过，有些人已经坚持了一年或更长时间，我渴望他们有信心。
Friday the TPP orientation meeting was in the Miller Room, the lounge on the second floor of Building 1. I finally met all the other students in one place. They were all bright enough, but most seemed to lack the focus and direction I expected of people at MIT. Some had survived a year or more, though, and I hungered for their confidence.
另一位新人是迈克尔·皮卡迪，他去年 5 月刚从威廉姆斯学院获得物理学学位。他的毕业论文题目是“黑洞的相对论效应”。
One of the other rookies was Michael Picardi, who'd just earned his physics degree from Williams College the previous May. His senior thesis was on "Relativistic Effects in Black Holes."
“你为什么不去读物理研究生？”我问他。
"Why aren't you going to physics graduate school?" I asked him.
“因为我不是韩国天才，我想过自己的生活，”他说。“我为此苦恼了一段时间，但有时你只能听从自己的直觉。我打算从事机械工程和节能。这似乎比物理学更近一点。核聚变最多需要四十年才能实现，我现在想做一些有用的事情。”
"Because I'm not a Korean genius and I want to have a life," he said. "I agonized over it a while, but sometimes you just have to go with your gut. I'm going to do mechanical engineering and energy conservation. It seems a little nearer-term than physics. Fusion isn't going to be feasible for forty years at best, and I want to do something useful now."
“哎呀，你听起来跟我一模一样，”我说，“只是我在霍普金斯大学三年级时放弃了物理。我还记得那道题。‘求一个无限长的均匀带电圆柱体几何中心的电势。’然后我选择了流体力学，作为一种折衷。至少你可以看到流体。你怎么能看到电场呢？”
"Gee, you sound just like me," I said. "Only I bailed out of physics in my junior year at Hopkins. I still remember the problem. 'Find the electrostatic potential at the geometric center of an infinitely long cylinder of uniform charge.' Then I took up fluid mechanics as sort of a compromise. At least you can see the fluids. How can you see an electric field?"
“我明白你的意思，”他说。“也许我们可以一起上一些课。”
"I know what you mean," he said. "Maybe we'll take some classes together."
平代克的办公室
Pyndike's office
9 月 8 日，星期二
Tuesday, September 8
“你参与了 TPP 计划，对吧？你肯定对与技术相关的话题更感兴趣。我真正想要找的是一个对经济和政策有更直接倾向的人。”
"You're in that TPP program, aren't you? You must be more interested in a topic dealing more with technology. I'm really looking for someone with a more straight economics and policy slant."
那天下午在格利克斯曼的办公室。“你参与了 TPP 项目，对吧？你肯定对政策之类的话题更感兴趣。我正在寻找一个直接在机械方面有专长的人。”
That afternoon in Glicksman's office. "You're in that TPP program, right? You must be more interested in a topic dealing more with policy and that kind of stuff. I'm really looking for someone with a straight mechanical direction."
周三，我与我的 TPP 导师戴维·马克斯 (David Marks) 见面。马克斯是一名土木工程教授，他研究出如何管理河流流域的水流，他的专长是修建几座水坝。杰瑞·科洪 (Jerry Cohon) 是我在霍普金斯大学一年级时的导师，也是马克斯的第一位博士生。
Wednesday, I met with my TPP adviser, David Marks. A civil engineering professor, he figured out how to manage water flows in river basins with several dams as his specialty. Jerry Cohon, my freshman faculty adviser at Hopkins, had been Marks's first Ph.D. student.
我说道：“我希望从TPP中获得扎实的工程背景和一些经济学知识，这样我就能计算出节能项目的成本效益。”
"What I want out of TPP is a sound engineering background and some economics so I can figure out cost-effectiveness of energy conservation programs," I said.
那么你应该离开 TPP。直接进入课程 2，获得机械工程学位。你似乎知道你想从这里得到什么。我们试图让有才华的人在这里实现他们想要的东西；我们试图不妨碍他们。但如果你一点都不确定，你就会陷入困境。顺便说一句，当你拨打男厕所的号码时，你就会知道我们找到了你。”
You should get out of TPP then. Go straight to Course 2get your degree in mechanical engineering. You seem to know what you want out of this place. We try to let talented people who know what they want achieve it here; we try to stay out of their way. But if you're at all uncertain, you'll be in for a rough time. By the way, you'll know we've got you when you call the men's room by its number."
我从 TPP 转行到真正的机械工程的最后一关是与机械工程专业研究生导师沃伦·罗森诺 (Warren Rohsenow) 的会面。我仍然不知道我被录取的全部情况，我有点担心，如果试图离开 TPP，可能会发现他们让我入学时犯了错误。
The last hoop of my transition from TPP to real mechanical engineering was the meeting with Warren Rohsenow, graduate adviser for mechanical engineering students. I still didn't know the full circumstances of how I was admitted, and I was a little scared that trying to leave TPP would uncover the error they may have made in letting me in.
罗森诺一边靠在椅子上，一边清理着烟斗，浏览了我的档案，然后平静地说：“你已经在这个部门了。”
Rohsenow, leaning back in his chair and cleaning his pipe, looked through my file and said matter-of-factly, "You're already in this department."
呼。
Phew.
现在有个坏消息。罗森诺继续说：“问题是，既然你在大学里没有选修机械工程，你就必须选修该系的所有本科核心课程：201 静力学、202 系统动力学与控制、294 动力学、231 材料强度和 270 设计。这就是交易；要么接受，要么放弃。”
Now the bad news. Rohsenow continued: "The hooker is, since you didn't take mechanical engineering in college, you'll have to take all the department's undergraduate core courses: twooh-one Statics, two-oh-two System Dynamics and Controls, twoninety-four Dynamics, two-thirty-one Strength of Materials, and two seventy Design. That's the deal; take it or leave it."
我的契约奴役期限刚刚翻了一倍。“我仍然想从我擅长领域的研究生课程开始，”我说。“我认为这会帮助我找到资金。”
My term of indentured servitude had just doubled. "I'd still like to start with the graduate courses in my strong areas," I said. "I think it'll help me find funding."
“好吧。”噗噗。“要我说，这听起来有点奇怪，但这是你的决定。你的硕士学位需要六门研究生课程，所以最好完成其中三门。”
"Well." Puff puff. "It sounds kind of bass ackwards if you ask me but it's your decision. You need six graduate courses for your master's so it'll be good to get three of them out of the way."
“谢谢你的签名，”我说，“看来你要教热传递课了，我想课堂上见。”
"Thank you for your signature," I said. "It looks like you'll be teaching heat transfer, so I guess I'll see you in class."
“好的。课堂上见。”
"Right. See you in class."
章节
C H A P T E R
2
2
班级
Class
1981 年 9 月 10 日，星期四
Thursday, September 10, 1981
上午 9:23 3-214 室，位于二楼走廊尽头，在大楼角落，可以看到河流。空气中弥漫着一丝秋天的气息。这间 30 英尺乘 40 英尺的教室的地板上摆放着 100 张硬木电影院椅子，每张椅子都有一个从椅子扶手上向上摆动的小桌面。我在第二排中间偏左的地方选了一张。离黑板足够近，也足够远，如果他们在这里这样做的话，就不会被第一个叫到。
9:23 A.M. Room 3-214, on the second floor at the end of the hall, on the corner of the building with a view of the river. A hint of fall was in the air. The 100 hard wooden movie theatre chairs on the level floor of the 30-by-40-foot classroom each had a little desk surface that swung up from the arm of the chair. I picked one on the second row just left of center. Close enough to see the blackboard, far enough not to get called on first if that's what they do here.
阿谢尔·夏皮罗教授在三块黑板前略微升高的木制讲台上整理着 225 节《高级流体力学》的笔记。他看上去快要退休了，秃顶两侧留着长长的灰白头发。他穿着浅棕色灯芯绒裤和绿色高领毛衣，戴着一副小巧的银边半框眼镜，只有在低头看笔记时才会透过眼镜看。
Professor Ascher Shapiro arranged his notes for two twentyfive, Advanced Fluid Mechanics, on the table on the slightly elevated wooden platform in front of the three blackboards. He looked close to retirement age, with longish gray hair around the sides of the bald spot. He wore light brown corduroys, a green turtleneck, and small silver-rimmed half-spectacles that he looked through only when looking down at his notes.
快到 9:30 的时候，我周围一百多张桌子都坐满了。我的同学都是二十五六岁。很多都是美国人，但至少有三分之一是外国人。希腊人、韩国人、伊朗人、印度人、法国人、中国人都用他们的母语交谈。大约有五名女性。
The hundred or so desks filled around me as 9:30 approached. My fellow students were in their mid- to late twenties. Many Americans, but at least a third were foreigners. Greeks, Koreans, Iranians, Indians, French, Chinese conversed in their native tongues. There were about five women.
9 点 28 分，夏皮罗开始画图，9 点 30 分，他轻声说：“我想现在就开始。”他说话带有一点纽约口音。30 秒后，所有谈话都停止了。
At 9:28 Shapiro began drawing diagrams, and at 9:30 he quietly said, "I'd like to begin now." He had a slight New York accent. Thirty seconds later all the conversations had stopped.
“在我们开始之前，我想先介绍一下课堂上的一些细节。学期期间将有两次小测验和一次期末考试。在课程结束时，我们将分发一组问题供您在学期期间解决。这些不会用于上交或计入您的成绩。但是，我们强烈建议您做这些问题。做问题对于您掌握材料至关重要。做问题，我的意思不是模仿手册中已经解决的解决方案 - 我的意思是您需要自己开辟解决方案；开辟自己的道路，找到死胡同，回溯并继续前进。每周五将有两次辅导课。您可以来找 Gemayel 教授寻求帮助以找到解决方案。此外，我们希望鼓励您从讲座中记好笔记。学期结束时，您可以选择提交您的讲座笔记。如果做得好并且您的成绩介于两个等级之间，您将获得更高的分数。”
"Before we get started, I'd like to go over some housekeeping details for the class. There will be two quizzes during the term and a final exam. At the end of class we will be handing out a set of problems for you to work on during the term. These will not be for handing in or count toward your grade. However, we strongly recommend that you do them. It is essential for your mastery of the material that you do problems. And by doing problems, I don't mean mimicking a worked-out solution from a handbook-I mean that you need to pioneer your way through the solution yourself; blaze your own trail, find the dead ends, backtrack, and move on. There will be two tutorial sessions every Friday. You can come to these to ask Professor Gemayel for help finding solutions. Also, we want to encourage you to take good notes from the lectures. At the end of the term you will have the option of submitting your lecture notebook. If it is well done and you are on the borderline between one grade and another, you will receive the higher grade."
我想我们现在都是大孩子了，不用再被迫做作业了。不过我会写得很快，而且每节课后都会抄笔记。加分可能会派上用场。
I guess we're big boys and girls now and don't get forced into doing homework. I'll write fast, though, and copy over my notes after every class. The brownie points might come in handy.
“现在开始讲课，”夏皮罗继续说道。“流体力学是力学的一个分支。力学可以定义为研究运动、力和物体，以及力引起的物体运动之间的关系。流体力学的主题非常广泛，包括水力学、氢聚变反应堆中的等离子体、气体动力学、物理海洋学、磁流体力学和流体控制系统。这门课程非常高级，希望以比你以前经历过的更高程度的洞察力和复杂性来接近基础知识。”
"Now for the lecture," Shapiro continued. "Fluid mechanics is a branch of mechanics. Mechanics may be defined as the study of motions, forces, and bodies, and the relationships between the motions of bodies that are brought about by forces. The subject of fluid mechanics is very broad, including hydraulics, plasmas such as those in a hydrogen fusion reactor, gas dynamics, physical oceanography, magnetohydrodynamics, and fluid control systems. This particular course is advanced, approaching the fundamentals with what is hoped to be a greater degree of insight and sophistication than you may have experienced before."
他说话很有权威。自 20 世纪 50 年代初以来，他一定已经做了 27 次同样的演讲，他的演讲风格已经非常完美，堪称智慧的瑰宝。我尽可能快地写下，匆匆写下，心里暗自希望自己会速记；我不想错过任何一个细节。
He spoke as one having authority. The twenty-seven times he must have presented the identical lecture since the early 1950s had polished the presentation style, cut it down to a flawless gem of wisdom. I wrote, scribbled as fast as I could, briefly wishing that I knew how to take shorthand; I didn't want to miss a facet.
夏皮罗解释了密度。他首先在黑板上画了一些小块流体。它们是小圆圈，每个圆圈的中心到边缘都有一条小线。“我们有一个连续体模型；也就是说，我们将分子运动的影响建模为平均值，而不是观察每个分子。连续体完全是虚构的，它试图模拟现实。连续体和现实之间的联系在于，连续体属性应该代表真实材料的适当平均值。对于密度，我们为一个点分配密度值。我们给连续场中每个点的密度赋予一个值，作为空间和时间的函数。这是……取得的巨大智力飞跃。”
Shapiro explained density. He started by drawing little chunks of fluid. They were little circles on the blackboard, with a little line from the center to the edge of each circle. "We have a continuum model; that is, we model the effects of the molecular motion as an average instead of looking at each molecule. The continuum is a total fiction which attempts to model the real. The connection between the continuum and the real is that the continuum properties should represent appropriate averages of the real material. With density, we assign density values to a point. We give density a value at each point in our continuum field as a function of space and time. This is the giant intellectual leap made by ..."
我没听清名字。我会举手问。不，我会在笔记里留空，稍后再问。如果我知道他说的模特是什么意思就好了。
I didn't catch the name. I'll raise my hand and ask. No, I'll leave a blank in my notes and ask later. It would be nice if I knew what he meant by a model.
他的演讲让我回想起了学习物理的日子。我曾经有点对物理望而却步，而现在，那些适用于流体的抽象概念又回来困扰我了。但我喜欢流体。如果你理解它们，你就能知道龙卷风为什么会这样，为什么风在白天从海洋吹来，晚上又吹向海洋。我喝咖啡时能看到的不只是云。
His lecture brought me back to my physics days. I had sort of wimped out on physics, and here the same kind of abstract concepts that applied to fluids were coming back to haunt me. But I enjoy fluids. If you understand them, you can have an idea why a tornado does what it does, why the wind blows from the ocean in the day and to the ocean at night. I'll be able to see more than clouds in my coffee.
他优雅地继续讲解流体静力学——当流体静止时会发生什么。这正是土木工程师在建造大坝时担心的问题。水越深，压力越大。压力越大，大坝受到的力就越大。力越大，混凝土就越厚。否则水压会导致大坝破裂。学生们没有提问，只有全神贯注和快速书写。当 11:00 前铃声响起时，我已经在 18 张纸上记满了笔记。感觉信息量太大了，但至少在周二下课之前，我还有时间消化这些内容。
He elegantly continued, covering fluid statics-what happens when the fluid is standing still. This is what civil engineers worry about when they build dams. The deeper the water, the higher the pressure. The higher the pressure, the bigger the force on the dam. The bigger the force, the thicker the concrete. Otherwise the water pressure would cause the dam to burst. There were no questions from the students, only rapt attention and fast writing. When the bell rang just before 11:00, I had filled eighteen sheets of paper with notes. It felt like an information overload, but at least I had until Tuesday to digest the material before the next lecture.
夏皮罗最后说：“我想重申做题的重要性。通过自己做题，你会发现学习和被教之间存在巨大的差异。杰马耶勒教授将分发问题包。”我们一百个人走到前面，像交易大厅里的期权交易员一样围在杰马耶勒分发半英寸厚的问题包。
Shapiro finished by saying, "I want to reiterate the importance of doing problems. Through working problems on your own, you will find that there is an enormous difference between learning and being taught. Professor Gemayel will be handing out the problem packets." The one hundred of us went to the front, crowding around like options traders in a pit as Gemayel handed out the half-inch-thick packets.
在我等待的时候，我看到门口有一个看起来很眼熟的人。“打扰一下，”我说。“你是在约翰霍普金斯大学上学的吗？”
While I waited my turn I saw near the door a guy who looked familiar. "Excuse me," I said. "Did you go to Johns Hopkins?"
“是的，但我大三和大四的时候转学到了麻省理工学院。我的名字是马特·阿姆斯特朗。”
"Yeah, but I transfered to MIT for my junior and senior years. My name's Matt Armstrong."
我记得他在大一物理课上问过一些尖锐的问题。马特是一名“Simpy”（SMPY，即数学早熟青年研究）；七年级时，他参加了 SAT 数学考试，得了 700 分，是巴尔的摩七年级学生中最高的。这个分数使他有资格在大学阶段学习数学，直到高中毕业。我觉得马特在这门课上可能和我处于不同的水平。尽管他有数学天赋，但他是个好人。1975 年秋天，他的头发长及肩膀，但现在剪短了。
I remembered the acute questions he had asked in physics class freshman year. Matt had been a "Simpy" (for SMPY, Study of Mathematically Precocious Youth); in seventh grade he took the SAT math test and scored 700 on it, the highest of any seventh grader in Baltimore. That score qualified him to study math at the college level through high school. I had the feeling Matt might be on the other side of the bell curve from me in this class. Math talent notwithstanding, he was a nice guy. In the fall of 1975 he had had shoulder-length hair, but it was short now.
“毕业之后，你在做什么？”当我们沿着大厅走向无尽的走廊时，我问道。
"What have you been doing since you graduated?" I asked as we walked down the hall toward the infinite corridor.
“过去两年我在 128 号公路上的一家高科技公司工作，开发一种高效热水器。我应该很快就能拿到专利了。事实上，今天下午我必须去那里签一些文件。”
"I worked the past two years out at a high-tech company on Route 128, developing a high-efficiency water heater. I should be getting a patent on it soon. In fact, I have to go out there this afternoon to sign some papers."
专利。这家伙有专利。
Patent. This guy has a patent.
他问：“现在有课吗？”
He asked, "Do you have a class now?"
“是的。二四五一。”
"Yeah. Two four five one."
“嘿，太好了。我也坐二四五一的。也许我们可以找几个一起的座位。”
"Hey, that's great. I'm taking two four five one, too. Maybe we can find a couple of seats together."
长廊里气氛更加热烈，大家的步调比上课前稍快一些。仍然没有眼神交流。我感觉这些人没有浪费时间。
On the infinite corridor the air was more electric, the walking pace slightly faster than it had been before classes started. Still no eye contact. I had the feeling these people didn't waste time.
吉夫托普洛斯的演讲厅里有同样的电影椅桌，只是当你回到教室时，椅子的排数会增加。马特和我在第四排找到了两个。
Gyftopoulos's lecture hall had the same movie chair desks, only the rows went up as you went back in the room. Matt and I found two in the fourth row.
很多学生和 Fluids 班的学生一样。这个班上可能还有几个美国人。同样，大部分是男性，还有四五个女性。男女学生中没有很多特别好看的人，但眼神中却普遍流露出一种紧张专注的神情。很多男生看起来就像隔天才刮一次胡子。
A lot of the students were the same ones as in Fluids. Maybe there were a few more Americans in this class. Again, mostly men, with four or five women. There weren't many particularly goodlooking people of either gender, but there was a universal look of embattled concentration in the eyes. A lot of the guys looked like they only shaved every other day.
吉夫托普洛斯在教室前面和一个和我差不多年纪的男孩聊天，他留着浅棕色的胡子，下巴上只有一小撮胡须。这个年轻人只需要戴上单片眼镜，穿上合适的衣服，就可以出演《间谍》动画片了。11点过后几分钟，吉夫托普洛斯叫全班安静下来。当他看到我在第四排时，他微笑着朝我点了点头。
Gyftopoulos chatted at the front of the class with a guy about my age who had a light brown mustache and a small beard on his chin alone. All the younger guy needed was a monocle and the right clothes and he could have been in a "Spy" cartoon. A couple of minutes after 11:00 Gyftopoulos called the class to order. He smiled and nodded my way when he saw me in the fourth row.
“首先我想说几件家务事，”他说，“每周都会布置家庭作业，下周上课时交。此外，学期中还会有一到两次两小时的测验，外加一次期末考试。你的成绩 30% 取决于家庭作业，30% 取决于测验，40% 取决于期末考试。”
"First I want to go over a few housekeeping details," he said. "Homework will be assigned every week, due at the lecture the following week. Also there will be one or two two-hour quizzes during the term, plus a final examination. Your grade will be based 30 percent on homework, 30 percent on quizzes, and 40 percent on the final examination."
他和夏皮罗都把两小时的考试称为小测验，这很好。也许这是学校的政策，要把它们从期中考试或考试中淡化；小测验就是你在高中参加的十分钟的考试。至少我对作业的评分和计数感到欣慰。我想如果我能坚持下去，我应该能在班上取得不错的成绩。
It was nice how both he and Shapiro called the two-hour tests quizzes. Perhaps it was institute policy to mellow-speak them down from midterm examination or test; a quiz is what you take for ten minutes in high school. At least I was comforted by the grading and counting of the problem sets. I figured if I could just hang in with those, I should be able to do respectably in the class.
吉夫托普洛斯继续说道：“吉安·保罗·贝雷塔将帮助我授课；他也会随时解答你的任何问题。当然，欢迎你随时来我的办公室提问。”
Gyftopoulos continued, "Gian Paolo Beretta will be helping me teach the class; he will also be available to assist you with any questions you may have. And of course you are always welcome to come to my office to ask questions."
我想，贝雷塔一定很聪明。如果他在教书，那他一定已经拥有博士学位了，这对于一个 24 岁的人来说已经很不错了。
Beretta must be brilliant, I thought. If he's teaching he must already have his Ph.D., which isn't bad for a twenty-four-yearold.
“由于没有现成的教材来教我们这里要讲的内容，所以您需要购买我和 Gian Paolo 整理的一套课堂笔记。请您坐在座位上，我们会计算要复制的笔记数量。”
"Since there are no texts available that teach what we shall be presenting here, you will be required to purchase a set of class notes that Gian Paolo and I have put together. Please remain seated while we count the number of sets to reproduce."
吉安·保罗 (Gian Paolo) 开始数数，我也一样。马特 (Matt) 上下左右看了看，当吉安·保罗 (Gian Paolo) 坐在第二排时，马特大声喊道：“七十六。”
Gian Paolo started counting, as did I. Matt looked up and down, to the left and the right, and by the time Gian Paolo was on the second row Matt said out loud, "Seventy-six."
“很好。谢谢你，”吉夫托普洛斯说道，对于马特如此肯定地说出的数字，他没有提出任何疑问。
"Good. Thank you," Gyftopoulos said, not questioning the number that Matt had stated with such conviction.
我轻声问马特：“你怎么数得这么快？”
I asked Matt quietly, "How'd you count so fast?"
“每排有 14 把椅子。一共有 6 排，一共有 84 把，还有 8 个空座位。一共有 76 把。”
"Each row has 14 chairs. There are 6 rows-that's 84-and there're 8 empty seats. That's 76."
好吧，我想我们知道谁会在这门课上获得 A。
Well, I guess we know who's going to get an A in this class.
吉夫托普洛斯再次说道：“我希望你们在讲座期间也可以自由提问。我不会定期点名学生，但我可能会不时请人帮忙推导。”
Again Gyftopoulos: "I want you to feel free to ask any questions during the lecture also. I will not be calling on students as a regular practice, but I may from time to time ask someone to help with a derivation."
不像苏格拉底式教学法那么糟糕，但我应该跟上这里的阅读和问题集。通常工程课程是单向数据传输；你试图跟上讲座的逻辑流程，但只有教授在被提问时必须快速思考。但 Gyftopoulos 会挑战我们，也许也会挑战我。
Not quite as bad as the Socratic method, but I should keep up with the reading and problem sets here. Usually engineering classes are one-way data transfer; you try to keep up with the lecture's logic flow, but only the professor has to think fast when questioned. But Gyftopoulos would challenge us, and maybe challenge me.
“现在开始讲课，”吉夫托普洛斯继续说道。“课程名称还是‘一般热力学’。一般是指这门课程方法的几个方面。首先，阐述的是一种适用于所有系统的方法，无论其大小。其次，结果将适用于我们系统的所有状态和条件。第三，这种方法表明热力学不是一个封闭的领域，而是包括许多开放的领域，可供讨论和新的分析。标题中的热力学是指对物质的性质以及物质性质的变化的研究；因此是物质不同部分之间的相互作用。热力学科学比力学更普遍，因为它可以描述热体和冷体，这是力学科学无法描述的领域。此外，力学无法处理熵的概念。”
"Now for the lecture," Gyftopoulos went on. "The course title again is 'General Thermodynamics.' General refers to several as pects of the approach to the course. First of all, the exposition is of an approach that is valid for all systems, regardless of their size. Second, the results will be valid for all states and conditions of our systems. Third, the approach suggests that thermodynamics is not a closed field, but rather includes many areas that are open for discussion and new analysis. Thermodynamics in the title refers to a study of the properties of matter and the changes in properties of matter which occur; thus the interactions of different parts of matter. The science of thermodynamics is more general than mechanics in that it can describe hot and cold bodies, an area that the science of mechanics is incapable of describing. In addition, mechanics cannot deal with the concept of entropy."
对了。什么是状态？什么是系统？什么是熵？我继续写，写得飞快。
Right. What's a state? What's a system? What is entropy? I kept writing, scribbling fast.
“现在来谈谈一些基本概念，”吉夫托普洛斯继续说道。“与任何科学方法一样，我们将集中精力于宇宙的一小部分，即系统。系统至少需要两样东西：（a）系统中物质的数量——其质量——和（b）约束或外部参数——即，你必须定义系统边界。现在我们如何分析系统？有两种可能。第一，在某一时刻，第二，作为时间函数。
"Now for some basic concepts," Gyftopoulos continued. "As in any scientific approach, we shall concentrate on a small part of the universe, a system. A system needs at least two things: (a) the amount of matter in the system-its mass-and (b) constraints or external parameters-i.e., you must define the system boundary. Now how do we analyze systems? There are two possibilities. First at one instant in time, and second as a function of time.
“在某一时刻，系统的状态或条件是分析系统的一个重要概念。如果你了解系统及其状态，你就可以计算出你想知道的某一时刻的一切。状态是一组数字或参数，使我们能够计算属性。”
"At one instant in time, the state or condition of the system is a powerful concept in analyzing the system. If you know the system and its state, you can calculate everything you want to know for the one instant of time. State is a set of numbers or parameters that allow us to calculate properties."
对了。什么是财产？
Right. What's a property?
“其次，时间函数分析依赖于运动方程来描述从一种状态到另一种状态的转变。”
"Second, the function-of-time analysis relies on the equation of motion to describe the transition from one state to another."
吉夫托普洛斯又用类似的抽象术语讲了一个小时。马特认真听着，做了一整套笔记，而我则在一旁草草地记着，一边追随他推理的点点滴滴，一边想着这一切与我成为能源沙皇的愿望有什么关系。我稍后会把笔记抄下来。
Gyftopoulos talked in similar abstract terms for another hour. Matt listened attentively and wrote a perfectly neat set of notes while I scribbled away, following bits and pieces of the line of reasoning but wondering where this all fit into my aspiration to be an energy czar. I would copy over the notes later.
“感谢您的关注。请拿一份下周的习题集和我写的一篇文章。”
"Thank you for your attention. Please pick up a copy of next week's problem set and the copy of an article I've written."
这篇文章的标题是“热力学原理”。它是从《大英百科全书》中转载的。
The article was entitled "Thermodynamics, Principles of." It was reprinted from Encyclopaedia Britannica.
离开教室时，我问马特：“喂，马特，你知道哪里有课桌吗？我在课程开始前退出了技术与政策项目，他们想要我的课桌回来。”
I asked Matt as we left the classroom, "Say there, Matt, do you know of any desks anywhere? I quit the Technology and Policy Program just before classes started and they want my desk back."
“所以你放弃了 TPP？听起来是个不错的选择。我的办公室里有一张空着的办公桌。你为什么不和系秘书夏洛特·埃文斯谈谈，看看能不能弄到钥匙？我可不想看到你推着满满一车书在学院里闲逛。顺便问一下，你踢足球吗？我们正在组建一支校内足球队。它叫 Calorics。我们今晚 6:30 有训练。”
"So you punted TPP? Sounds like a good move. There's a desk in my office that's available. Why don't you talk to Charlotte Evans, the department secretary, and see if you can get a key? I'd hate to see you wandering around the institute with a shopping cart full of books. By the way, do you play soccer? We're putting a team together for intramurals. It's called the Calorics. We've got a practice tonight at 6:30."
“是的，听起来很棒。我在欧洲玩过一段时间。听起来这也是结识一些人的好方法。也许可以获得一些资金。你有 RA 吗？”
"Yeah, that sounds great. I played a little bit in Europe. Sounds like a good way to meet some people, too. Maybe get some funding. Do you have an R.A.?"
“我正在为格利克斯曼公司做泡沫冰箱隔热材料氟碳化合物的除气工作。他大约一周前才雇用我。你呢？”
"I'm working on outgassing of fluorocarbons for foam refrigerator insulation for Glicksman. He just hired me about a week ago. How about you?"
“我很高兴至少那个研究助理职位给了一个好人。他拒绝了我。我还在找。如果你听到任何消息，也许你可以告诉我。你午餐吃什么？”我问道。
"I'm glad that at least that research assistantship went to a nice guy. He turned me down for it. I'm still looking. If you hear of anything, maybe you can let me know. What are you doing for lunch?" I asked.
“我要去哈佛广场见我的妻子克劳迪娅。也许我们三个人可以聚一聚。”
"I'm going up to Harvard Square to meet my wife, Claudia. Maybe the three of us can get together some time."
哇，这家伙什么都有。RA、头脑、妻子克劳迪娅。他甚至可能有一套平整的公寓。这让我想起我应该给斯蒂芬妮打电话。但首先在沃克吃午餐。
Gee, this guy's got it all. R.A., brains, wife Claudia. He probably even has an apartment with a level floor. Which reminds me I should give Stephanie a call. But first lunch at Walker.
一个人吃饭并不好玩，但如果有课本可以看的话，还是可以忍受的。似乎有一半的桌子都被一个人占了，所以一个人吃饭对我来说没那么困扰。此外，那天晚上还有足球和同伴。
It's not fun to eat by yourself, but it's tolerable if you have the notes from your classes to look over. It seemed like about half the tables were occupied by parties of one, so it didn't bother me so much to be alone. Besides, there would be soccer and company that evening.
接下来的半个小时里，我都在男厕所里呕吐。如果你有课堂笔记可以回顾的话，那还是可以忍受的。我纳闷，这到底是怎么回事？我已经压力山大了吗？我真的应该坐在办公桌前抄这些笔记。这到底是怎么回事？我得走了。
I spent the next half hour sick in the men's room. It's tolerable if you have the notes from your classes to look over. What is it? I wondered. Am I stressed out already? I should really be at my desk copying over these notes. What's the story here? I've got to get going.
我花了三个小时抄写夏皮罗的课笔记。这很辛苦，但他的话语却很新鲜，我把能记得的每句话都写下来。这就像我遇见了摩西，他口述了十诫。我也知道我能做到。他布置的题目又是另一回事。我不敢打开纸包，直到完成抄写工作。一次完成一项任务，先完成最简单的任务。
It took three hours to copy over the notes from Shapiro's class. It was painstaking, but his words were fresh and I wrote every one I could remember. It was as if I'd met Moses and he'd dictated the Ten Commandments. It was also something I knew I could do. The problems that he'd handed out were another story. I dared not crack the packet until I'd finished the transcribing job. Complete one task at a time, the easiest ones first.
火车要开出车站了。它开得很慢，但很快就会加速。现在我可以走在火车旁边，或者小跑着，但迟早我得上车，否则我就会跟不上它。
The train was leaving the station. It was going slowly but would soon pick up speed. Now I could walk or trot beside it, but sooner or later I would have to get on board or I would lose it.
踢足球让我松了一口气。我偶然遇到了迈克尔·皮卡迪，并招募了他；他想当守门员。我的左脚射门不错，所以我自愿踢左边锋。
Soccer was a welcome relief. I'd bumped into and recruited Michael Picardi; he wanted to play goalie. I had a decent shot with my left foot, so I volunteered to play left wing.
足球队来自传热实验室，因此命名为 Caloric，以古老的热传递理论命名。来自墨西哥的 Carlos Lopez（论文主题：核电站管道中的蒸汽流动）将担任左后卫。Dave Orlowski（论文主题：半导体晶体生长中热传导的计算机模拟）是教练兼中锋；他即将完成博士学位。Hamid Reza 为 Gyftopoulos 研究量子热力学，并担任右后卫。Robin Thomas 是另一个理论计算机型的人。Ted Bain 来自英国，正在为 Gemayel 研究流动流体中的沸腾。Norm Jason 拥有流化床煤燃烧方面的研究助理学位，并正在为他在密歇根大学毕业设计中设计的安全梯申请专利。我感觉我立即加入了一个兄弟会。他们友好而聪明，他们接受了我。
The soccer team was from the Heat Transfer Lab, hence the name Caloric, after the archaic caloric theory of heat transmission. Carlos Lopez (thesis topic: steam flow in piping in nuclear power plants) from Mexico would play left halfback. Dave Orlowski (thesis topic: computer simulation of heat conduction in semiconductor crystal growth) was the coach and center forward; he was about to finish his Ph.D. Hamid Reza worked on quantum thermodynamics for Gyftopoulos and played right fullback. Robin Thomas was another theoretical computer type. Ted Bain was from England and was working for Gemayel on boiling in a moving fluid. Norm Jason had an R.A. in fluidized bed coal combustion and was patenting the safety ladder he'd designed for his senior project at Michigan. I felt like I'd joined an instant fraternity. They were friendly and smart, and they accepted me.
在午后的阳光下，从操场上看，学院看起来十分美丽。两个圆顶建筑并排排列，远处是高耸的绿色建筑——知识的密集聚集地。
The institute looks lovely from the playing fields in the afternoon sun. The two domes line up beside each other with the highrise Green Building behind them both in the distance-a dense pack of knowledge.
感觉就像秋天。感觉就像高中。感觉当我踢足球时一切都会好起来。
It felt like fall. It felt like high school. It felt like things were going to be all right when I played soccer.
我打电话给斯蒂芬妮。
I called Stephanie.
“你好，”她说。
»Allo,« she said.
“你好，宝贝，是我，佩珀。”
"Salut, cherie, it's moi, Pepper."
哦，Peppeur，你好吗？«
Oh, Peppeur, how are yoouu? «
“很好，谢谢，但事情变得很忙乱。听着，斯蒂芬妮，我一直想……”
"Fine, thanks, but things are becoming hectic. Say listen, Stephanie, I've been meaning to ..."
“我刚刚给你寄了一个爱心包裹。里面有一些 Godiva 巧克力和一些我们常去的意大利面包店的饼干。”
»I juste sent you a care package. Some Godiva chocolates and some biscuits from the Italian bakery we go to. «
“噢，哇。谢谢。哎，我……呃。”
"Oh, wow. Thanks. Say, I ... uh."
“我爱你，佩珀。”
»Je t'aime, Peppeur.«
“我也爱你。”
"I love you, too."
回到 20 号楼。我至少还有几天时间可以使用 TPP 办公桌，还有办公室钥匙，因此可以借用沙发过夜。Gyftopoulos 的讲稿只花了两个小时就抄完了，包括我休息时从走廊尽头的自动售货机买奶酪和花生酱饼干以及一杯加了奶油和糖的茶的时间。这样就留出了一些时间来研究大英百科全书中有关热力学的文章。
Back to Building 20. I had my TPP desk for at least a few more days, plus the key to the office and therefore access to the couch for staying over nights. Gyftopoulos's lecture notes took only two hours to copy, including my break to get cheese and peanut butter crackers and a cup of tea with extra cream and extra sugar from the vending machine down the hall. That left some time to crack into the Encyclopaedia Britannica article on thermodynamics.
一切始于伽利略和他发明的第一台温度计。天哪，文艺复兴时期的人什么都做。然后在理性时代，布莱克发明了热质理论，我的足球队就是以它命名的，最后卡诺先生发明了蒸汽机理论，詹姆斯·瓦特发明了蒸汽机。然后克劳修斯完善了熵的概念，尽管他从未真正定义过它。这读起来很有趣，但对解决问题没有帮助。
It started with Galileo and the first thermometer that he invented. Gee, those Renaissance guys did everything. Then in the Age of Reason, Black invented the caloric theory after which my soccer team was named, and finally Monsieur Carnot came along and invented the theory for the steam engine that James Watt invented. Then Clausius perfected the concept of entropy, although he never really defined it. It made interesting reading but it wouldn't help on the problem set.
啊，是的，问题集。现在正是开始的时候。打字很整齐。问题 1 看起来轻而易举。“一个房间里有 10 桶油，空气足以让油完全燃烧。燃烧时，这种油最多可以向环境中的系统传输 600 万英热单位/桶。a. 如果燃烧时没有向环境传输任何能量，那么房间内容物的总质量会有什么变化？”
Ah yes, the problem set. No time like the present to get started. It was neatly typed. Problem 1 looked like a piece of cake. "A room contains 10 barrels of oil and adequate air for the complete combustion of the oil. Upon burning, this oil can transfer a maximum of 6 million btu/barrel to systems in the environment. a. If the combustion occurs without any energy transfer to the environment, what is the change in total mass of the contents of the room?"
小菜一碟。我想，房间是封闭的，就像一个封闭的系统，所以质量不会有任何变化。我的意思是，它会从哪里来？或者去哪里？
Piece of cake. The room is closed, I guess, like a closed system, so there won't be any change in mass. I mean where's it going to come from? Or go to?
问题 a 的下一部分。“如果最大能量被转移到环境中，油气混合物和燃烧产物之间的质量变化是什么？”
Next part of question a. "What is the change in mass between the oil-air mixture and the products of combustion if the maximum energy is transferred to the environment?"
答案：同样的事情。有什么区别？质量仍然守恒。
Answer: Same thing. What difference does it make? Mass is still conserved.
“b. 如果铀235裂变每次裂变可产生2亿电子伏的可转移能量，那么多少克铀235的能量相当于10桶石油？”
"b. If a uranium 235 fission can yield a transferrable energy of 200 million electron-volts per fission, how many grams of U-235 are the energy equivalent of 10 barrels of oil?"
说什么？他在讲座上没有提到任何有关 U-235 的事情。他有什么资格在问题集上提出这一点？然后我想起来他也是一名核工程教授，这门课也是核工程课。我记得这是麻省理工学院。这个问题的目的一定是向我们展示少量的铀如何取代大量的石油。这基本上是一个将能量值从物理学家测量能量的电子伏特转换为工程师测量能量的英热单位 (Btus) 的练习。
Say what? He didn't say anything about U-235 in the lecture. What business does he have pulling that out on the problem set? Then I remembered that he was also a nuclear engineering professor, and the class was also a nuclear engineering class. And I remembered that this was MIT. The point of this problem must be to show us what a piddly amount of uranium takes the place of a huge amount of oil. This is basically an exercise in converting the energy values from electron-volts, what physicists measure energy in, to British thermal units (Btus), what engineers measure energy in.
我计算了一下换算系数，结果显示不到一克，或接近几粒盐的重量。核能。安全、清洁、可靠。
I cranked through the conversion factors and it came out to just less than a gram, or close to the weight of several grains of salt. Nuclear power. Safe, clean, reliable.
问题 2 看起来有点难，而且已经 10:30 了，所以我骑上自行车回家，那是一套四居室公寓，位于奥尔斯顿一栋下陷的三层楼的二楼。你可以不用推车就从前面滑到后面的走廊，但每月 80 美元的价格很合适。我的床是一张床垫，吉姆·斯图尔特和我把它绑在他的旧 Impala 上，从萨默维尔的二手家具店开过来的。这盏花色的小台灯是麻省理工学院家具交易会上最便宜的。我希望我的生活水平正在触底。
Problem 2 looked a little harder and it was already 10:30 so I hopped on my bike for home, a four-bedroom apartment on the first floor of a sagging triple-decker in Allston. You could skateboard down the hallway from the front to the back without pushing, but at $80 a month the price was right. My bed was a mattress that Jim Stuart and I had roped onto his old Impala and had driven from the used furniture store in Somerville. The flowery little table lamp was the cheapest one at the MIT furniture exchange. I hoped my standard of living was bottoming out.
我在附近的 7-Eleven 停下来，吃了个蜂蜜面包和一品脱巧克力牛奶，作为夜宵。热量很高，但我靠一天的劳作挣来的。7-Eleven 门内侧的玻璃映出我的影子；它的头发因为我工作时用手抚摸而竖了起来，看起来很疲惫。我想知道我是否会秃顶。
I stopped in at the neighborhood Seven-Eleven for a latenight snack of a honey bun and a pint of chocolate milk. Highly caloric, but I'd earned it with my labors of the day. My reflection stared back from the glass on the inside of the Seven-Eleven door; its hair was standing straight up from running my hand through it doing my work, and it looked tired. I wondered whether I'd go bald.
在厨房的餐桌旁，我室友的猫靠在我的脚踝上发出呼噜声。
At the kitchen table my roommate's cat purred against my ankle.
“离我远点，猫咪。现在我不想被打扰，”我轻声说道，以免吵醒任何人。“我只想在这里读我的地球仪上的漫画，享受我的蜂蜜面包和巧克力牛奶。”我推开猫咪，但它又回来了。
"Get away from me, cat. I don't want to be bothered now," I said softly so as not to wake anyone. "I just want to read the funnies in my Globe here and enjoy my honey bun and chocolate milk." I nudged the cat away but it came back.
“呼呼呼”，它叫着，依偎在我的小腿前面。
"Purrrpurrr," it said, nestling on the front of my shin.
“我警告你。如果你想搭车，你就得搭车。”
"I'm warning you. You want to take a ride, you're going to take a ride."
“呼呼呼。”
"Purrrrpurrrr."
“你在那儿，我怎么能关注伊德巫师呢？”
"How can I pay attention to the Wizard of Id with you there?"
我轻轻地把猫举起来，离地面几英尺——好吧，也许更远一点，它落地后在灰色油毡地板上用爪子滑了几英寸。它又回来了，所以我猜我没有伤害它。
I lofted the cat gently, a couple of feet-well, maybe moreso it slid on its claws on the gray linoleum floor another couple of inches after landing. It came back again, so I guess I didn't hurt it.
“呼呼呼。”
"Purrpurrrr."
9 月 11 日，星期五
Friday, September 11
罗森诺的班上只有 20 名学生。其中一些学生 30 多岁，是从林恩的通用电气公司来攻读非全日制硕士学位的特殊学生。有几个学生在海军服役，他们正在攻读硕士课程；目的是让他们具备一定的心理素质，以便与拥有麻省理工学院等机构高级学位的国防工业顾问打交道。其余学生和我一样，都是 25 岁左右。
There were only twenty students in Rohsenow's class. Some were in their thirties, special students coming in from General Electric in Lynn to get their master's degrees part-time. A couple were in the navy, in the master's program that they follow; the intent is to give them some mental firepower to deal with the defense industry consultants, who have high-powered degrees from places like MIT. The rest were in their mid-twenties like me.
255。先进传热学。我在图书馆里查过罗森诺的背景，发现他创立并拥有剑桥的一家研发公司 Dynatech。Dynatech 雇用了大约 950 名员工，年销售额达 5100 万美元。罗森诺现年 60 多岁，战后不久在耶鲁大学获得博士学位。他的专长是沸水科学。如果你知道沸腾的原因，你就能算出核电站中水流经的管道应该有多大。你对沸腾了解得越多，你就可以把管道做得越小，晚上还能睡得着觉。如果管道更小，发电厂的成本就会更低，因此也是可行的。
Two fifty-five. Advanced Heat Transfer. I'd done a background check on Rohsenow in the library and found that he had founded and owned Dynatech, an R&D firm in Cambridge. Dynatech employed about 950 employees and had annual sales of $51 million. Rohsenow was in his sixties now and had received his Ph.D. at Yale just after the war. His specialty was the science of boiling water. If you know what causes boiling, you can figure out how big to make the tubes the water goes through in your nuclear power plant. The more you know about the boiling, the smaller you can make the tubes and still sleep at night. If the tubes are smaller, the power plant is less expensive, and therefore viable.
罗森诺身穿浅蓝色粗花呢夹克、深蓝色双面针织长裤、白色衬衫和蓝色领带。他秃顶，头发边缘留着一小撮棕色头发，戴着度数似乎不够的眼镜；上课前，他把眼镜往前倾斜，眯起眼睛看教室后面的时钟。
Rohsenow wore a light blue tweed jacket, darker blue doubleknit slacks, white shirt, and blue tie. He was bald with a little brown hair around the edges and wore glasses that seemed not quite strong enough; before he started the class, he tilted them forward and squinted to see the clock at the back of the room.
“好吧，我想是时候开始了，”他说着，把烟斗放在桌上的笔记旁边。“首先，我想介绍一些日常细节。我们整理了一套问题供你们做。我们不给它们评分，因为我们更愿意让你们有时间提问。”（或者，我想，是为了你们收入丰厚的咨询工作。）“每道题的答案都会贴在教室外面的黑板上，这样你们就可以去那里检查自己的作业。这里的杰米·穆罕默德将担任助教；每周他会进行一次辅导，你们可以向他询问有关作业的问题。”
"Well, I guess it's time to get started," he said, setting his pipe on the table by his notes. "First I'd like to go over some housekeeping details. We've put together a package of problems for you to do. We don't grade them because we'd rather have that time available for you to ask questions." (Or for your lucrative consulting jobs, I thought.) "The solutions for each problem will be posted on the board outside the classroom, so you can go there and check your own work. Jamie Mohammed here will be the teaching assistant; once a week he'll conduct a tutorial where you can ask him questions about the assignments."
“哦，还有成绩，”他继续说道。“学期末时，杰米和我会聚在一起，讨论你的性格是否良好。如果你性格良好，我们会给你 A 的成绩。”
"Oh, and about grades," he continued. "Jamie and I get together at the end of the term and we discuss whether or not you have a nice personality. If you do we give you an A."
现场传来紧张的笑声。他讲话缓慢，刻意，声音柔和深沉，在说到妙语时会停顿。
There was nervous laughter. He spoke slowly, deliberately, with a soft, deep voice and pauses at the punch lines.
“实际上，我们会进行两次测验，每次一小时，还有一次期末测验，三小时。如果你在一小时测验中表现更好，我们会更重视它。如果你在期末测验中表现更好，我们会说，‘太好了，他终于成功了’，我们会更重视它。如果你在两次测验中表现都不好，那么，你还有商学院可以选择。”
"Actually, we give two quizzes, each an hour long, and a final quiz, three hours long. If you do better on the hour quizzes, we weight them more heavily. If you do better on the final, we say, 'Hooray, he finally got it,' and we weight it more heavily. If you don't do well on either, well, there's always business school."
更加紧张的笑声。
More nervous laughter.
“现在开始今天的课程内容。”他拿起烟斗并试图点燃它。
"Now about the course material for the day." He picked up his pipe and tried to light it.
“解决任何问题都有几种方法。你可以用快速的方法解决，得到准确率在 20% 以内的答案，或者你可以用计算机解决，花两周时间进行设置，得到准确率在 2% 以内的答案。”
"There's a couple of ways to do any problem. You can do it the fast way, and get an answer that's accurate within 20 percent, or you can do it by computer, take two weeks setting it up, and get an answer that's accurate within 2 percent."
“现在你们这些家伙，”强调“你”，停顿了一下，“想当老板。我会告诉你们快捷方式。你们会在五分钟内完成，然后当你的助手来问你问题时，你就会拿出办法。你会看着他画出的图表，对他说，‘应该这样，而不是那样，’他会认为你很聪明……这让我想起一个故事。里科弗告诉我的。你知道，海军上将海曼·里科弗，核海军之父。他有一个年轻人为他工作。这孩子眼睛明亮，尾巴蓬松，刚从安纳波利斯出来。里科弗让他设计这种热交换器，用船上烟囱的废气加热水。因为我教过他，海曼就有了我即将向你们展示的诀窍。他知道热交换器应该和这个房间一样大。”
"Now you guys," accent on the you, pause, "want to be the boss. I'll show you the fast way. You'll do that in five minutes, and then pull it out of your sleeve when your assistant comes to ask you a question. You'll look at the graph he came up with and say to him, 'It should go this way, not that way,' and he'll think you're smart.... Reminds me of a story. Rickover told it to me. You know, Admiral Hyman Rickover, father of the nuclear navy. He had this young guy working for him. The kid was all brighteyed and bushy-tailed, straight out of Annapolis. Rickover gets him to design this heat exchanger to heat water with exhaust from the ship's smokestack. Since I'd taught it to him, Hyman had the trick I'm about to show you up his sleeve. He knew the heat exchanger should be about, say, as big as this room."
罗森诺抽了几口烟斗，挥动手臂示意房间的大小。
Rohsenow puffed on his pipe a couple of times and waved his arm around to indicate the size of the room.
“于是这孩子带着他的电脑走了，一周后回来告诉里科弗，热交换器应该和整艘船一样大。哈哈哈，”他咯咯笑着说。
"So the kid goes off with his computer and comes back a week later and tells Rickover the heat exchanger should be about as big as the whole ship. Ha ha ha," he chortled.
这孩子现在自己也是一名海军上将了。不过别担心，这个技巧也是我教他的。”
The kid's an admiral himself now. But don't worry; I taught him the trick, too."
那天晚上，我独自一人在 TPP 办公室里完成了一些热力学作业。我觉得这跟我读过和听到的商学院或法学院不一样。我们都在学习各自的课程，大部分都是自学。我们必须通过搜索自己的知识、推理、查阅书籍来学习。
That night I plowed through some more thermo homework, alone in the TPP office. This isn't like what I'd read and heard about business or law school, I thought. We're all taking our individual courses, mostly on our own. We have to learn by searching our own knowledge, by reasoning, by looking things up in books.
11:30，我透过窗户望向发电厂烟囱喷出的烟柱。烟柱缓缓向上汇聚。烟柱微微弯曲，在东剑桥犯罪率高的天空中划出一道翻腾的白橙色弧线。我想知道关于那道弧线的一切，想知道如何减少它。
At 11:30 I looked out the window at the plume from the power plant's smokestack. The stack converged gently upward. The plume bent over slightly and made a billowing white-orange arc across the high-crime-lit sky of East Cambridge. I wanted to know everything about that arc, how to make less of it.
我把橄榄褐色的睡袋铺在办公室的沙发上，抓起一个椅垫当枕头，打开收音机时钟，收听 WBUR 频道的拉丁音乐。一列由柴油机车牵引的油罐车缓缓驶过，距离近得足以震动整座大楼；主街道口的铃声叮叮叮响起。火车停在发电厂旁。
I unrolled the olive drab sleeping bag onto the office couch, grabbed a chair cushion for a pillow, and tuned to the Latin music on WBUR on the clock radio. A train of oil tank cars pulled by a diesel locomotive rolled by slowly, close enough to shake the building; the Main Street grade crossing bell ding ding dinged. The train stopped at the power plant.
我想知道斯蒂芬妮怎么样了。
I wondered how Stephanie was.
章节
C H A P T E R
3
3
休息
Break
81 年 10 月 6 日星期二
Tuesday 10/6/81
亲爱的爸爸妈妈，
Dear Ma + Pa,
抱歉这么久没写信了。我现在写得很快。课程继续快速进行。周五开始一周的第一次考试。周五我和我的传热学教授谈了两个小时，通过问他很多关于讲座材料的具体问题，得到了一些好主意……包括一些他不知道如何回答的问题。我还提醒他注意一个已经在他的书上存在二十年的错别字。
Sorry for not writing for so long. I'm writing now very fast. Classes continue to move at fast pace. First test a week from Friday. I talked to my heat transfer prof for two hours on friday got some good Ideas by asking him lots of specific questions on lecture mat'l ... including a few he didn't know how to answer. I also brought to his attention a typo that had been in his book for twenty years.
我以 180 美元的价格卖掉了我的赛道自行车，所以现在我肯定可以毫无问题地度过这个学期。我们又踢了足球，以 1-0 获胜。非常有趣；我感觉我的状态正在恢复。
I sold my track bike for $180 so now I definitely can make it through this term sans probleme. We played soccer again, winning 1-0. Lots of fun; I feel like I'm getting into reasonable shape.
现在的日常是早上 6:30 起床，沿着查尔斯河骑行到麻省理工学院，现在日出很美，看到船员们在那个时候划船逆流而上。波士顿市中心的景色很美，阳光透过建筑物照进来，远处的光线非常橙色。然后阅读，然后在食堂吃丰盛的早餐。然后学习或写信（这大概是第一次）。然后上课，然后学习。我在食堂吃完午饭后大约晚上 10:00 离开。晚餐 = 大楼里的自动售货机。学习很多，努力掌握概念。
Routine is now get up at 6:30, ride in along Charles River to MIT, great sunrises now, see crews rowing up the Chas. at that hour. Nice view of downtown Boston, with sun coming through buildings, light very orange in distance. Then read then big breakfast at dining hall. Then study or write letters (this is about the first time). Then classes then study. I leave at about 10:00 P.m. after lunch in dining hall. Dinner = vending machines in Building. Learning very much, striving to master concepts.
一位教授拥有一家节能咨询公司，因此也许有工作机会。
One prof has consulting firm in energy conservation so maybe job possibility in offing.
得走了。
Gotta go.
爱，胡椒
Love, Pepper
TPP 办公室。上午 8:00
TPP Office. 8:00 A. M.
9 月 12 日，星期六
Saturday, September 12
热电偶，问题 3
Thermo, Problem 3
“日常生活中一项重要的任务是从地下井抽水。除其他方法外，这可以通过人力或机器来完成。我们希望比较这两种从 300 英尺深处抽取 10,000 加仑水的方法的能源成本。假设一个人以鸡蛋为食。
"An important task in everyday life is the pumping of water from underground wells. Among other methods, this can be carried out either by human effort or by a machine. We wish to compare the energy costs of these two methods of pumping 10,000 gallons from a depth of 300 feet. Assume that a person is fed with eggs.
“一颗鸡蛋可提供 80 千卡（即普通人所说的卡路里）的能量，每打鸡蛋的价格约为 1.20 美元。人体利用类似于固定自行车的踏板驱动装置，将热量食物转化为肌肉力量的效率约为 25%。
"An egg provides 80 kilogram-calories (kcal) (a.k.a. calories to the layperson) of energy and costs about $1.20 per dozen. The human body transforms caloric food into muscle power with an efficiency of about 25 percent, by using a pedal-powered apparatus similar to a stationary bicycle.
“汽油发动机将燃料转化为动力的效率约为 25%。汽油可提供约 20,000 Btu/磅质量，价格约为每加仑 3.00 美元（美国以外的大多数地方）。
"A gasoline engine transforms fuel into motive power with an efficiency of about 25 percent. Gasoline can make available about 20,000 Btu/pound-mass and is priced at about $3.00 per gallon (in most places except the United States).
“a. 找出这两种抽水方法各自的能源成本。”
"a. Find the energy cost of each of these two methods of pumping the water."
答案。这还是高中毕业后的事情。如果他们一直这样，我不会有问题。只需计算将 10,000 加仑的水提升 300 英尺所需的能量。然后计算出所需的鸡蛋数量，同时考虑每个鸡蛋的能量含量和鸡蛋转化效率。（405 个鸡蛋。）汽油也是如此。（1.10 加仑。）我宁愿吃四百个鸡蛋，也不愿喝一加仑汽油。
Answer. This is still right out of high school. If they stay like this I'll have no problems. Just calculate the amount of energy required to raise the 10,000 gallons of water the 300 feet. Then figure out the number of eggs required, taking into account the energy content of each egg and the efficiency of egg conversion. (405 eggs.) Ditto for the gasoline. (1.10 gallons.) I'd rather eat four hundred eggs than drink a gallon of gasoline.
“b. 通过考虑其他食品，并在您的近似计算中包括资本和劳动力成本，您会推荐哪两种抽水方式？用一段话表达您的考虑和建议。”
"b. By considering other foodstuffs and including in your approximate calculations both capital and labor costs, which of the two ways of pumping water would you recommend? Express your considerations and recommendations in a paragraph or so."
我认为这又很简单。算一下，四分之一马力的人大约需要 50 个小时；每小时 4 美元，这个人大约需要 200 美元。再加上鸡蛋的 40 美元左右，总共需要 240 美元。我估计自行车设备和发动机的成本大致相同。那么，人的成本大约是泵的 73 倍。
This again is easy, I thought. Figure about 50 hours for the quarter-horsepower person; at $4 an hour that's about $200 for the person. Add to that the $40 or so for the eggs, and you have $240. I'll figure the bicycle apparatus and the engine would cost about the same. Then it comes to about 73 times as expensive for the human as for the pump.
第四题进行到一半时，迈克尔·皮卡迪走进了办公室。“你想去看看‘天空艺术’展览吗？”他问道。
Halfway through Problem 4 Michael Picardi came into the office. "Do you want to go see the 'Sky Art' exhibit?" he asked.
“当然可以。‘天空艺术’展览是什么？”我回答道。
"Sure. What's the 'Sky Art' exhibit?" I answered.
“他们在学生中心旁边的四合院里展示各种空中雕塑。来自新英格兰各地的艺术家们都在展示他们的作品。如果我们现在去，我们就能赶上‘天空水母’的发射。”
"They're displaying various airborne sculptures in the quadrangle by the student center. Various artists from around New England are exhibiting their work. If we go now, we can catch the launch of the 'Sky Jellyfish.' "
“听起来很有趣。我们走吧。”我说。
"Sounds interesting. Let's go," I said.
艺术家准备发射这只天空水母。他请迈克尔、我和其他五个人抓住天空触手的末端，同时他用氦气给碗状的身体充气。这东西膨胀到大约有莱维顿后院游泳池那么大。它全部由银色和红色的聚酯薄膜制成，聚酯薄膜是包裹卫星的坚韧塑料。
The artist prepared the sky-jellyfish for launch. He enlisted Michael, me, and five others to hold onto the ends of the skytentacles, while he inflated the bowl-shaped body with helium. The thing expanded to about the size of a backyard swimming pool in Levittown. It was all made of silver and red Mylar, the tough plastic they wrap satellites with.
“你能相信他们把这称为艺术吗？”我对迈克尔说。
"Can you believe they call this art?" I said to Michael.
“注意，”迈克尔说。“快到发射时间了。”
"Pay attention," Michael said. "It's almost time for launch."
艺术家说：“现在我要把这个充气完毕，然后我们从五开始倒数。当倒数到零时，每个人都放开他们手里的东西。”
The artist said, "Now I'm going to finish inflating this and then we'll have the countdown from five. When we get to zero, everyone let go of what they're holding."
“五、四、三、二、一”，我们齐声念道。
"Five, four, three, two, one," we all chanted in unison.
“升空，”穿着 NASA T 恤的人说道。
"Lift-off," said the guy wearing the NASA T-shirt.
在 T 加 15 秒时，我对迈克尔说：“我敢肯定。它看起来确实像水母。看看触手和身体漂浮和摆动的样子。这家伙一定计算过所有这些东西，聚酯薄膜的厚度、身体中氦气和空气的混合，以及触手的长度和宽度。”
At T plus 15 seconds I said to Michael, "I'll be doggoned. It does look like a jellyfish. Just look at the way the tentacles and the body are floating and oscillating. The guy must have calculated all that stuff, the thickness of the Mylar, the mixture of helium and air in the body, the length and width of the tentacles."
“是啊，要不然就是他运气好。我们只希望那些聚酯薄膜不会把‘空中巨无霸’击落，”迈克尔说。“喂，你饿了吗？你愿意和我一起吃沙拉三明治吗？”
"Yeah, either that or he's lucky. Let's just hope all that Mylar doesn't bring down a 'sky-jumbo-jet,' " Michael said. "Say, are you hungry? Would you like to join me for a falafel?"
“当然了。自从两个月前去伊斯坦布尔之后，我就没再吃过沙拉三明治了。”
"Sure. I haven't had a falafel since I was in Istanbul two months ago."
“你去了伊斯坦布尔？你看过圣索菲亚大教堂吗？那座献给智慧的教堂。”
"You went to Istanbul? Did you see Hagia Sofia, the church dedicated to wisdom?"
“是的。非常漂亮。”
"Yes. It was beautiful."
迈克尔继续说道：“我永远不会忘记我的艺术史教授展示的幻灯片。‘请注意他们如何隐藏圆顶的支撑方式，’他说。‘请注意在天花板高耸的垂直度下舞动的闪烁光柱。’光柱真的会闪烁吗？”
Michael continued, "I'll never forget the slides my Art History professor showed. 'Note how they hid the means of support of the dome,' he said. 'Note the shimmering pencils of light dancing beneath the ceiling's soaring verticality.' Did the pencils of light really shimmer?"
“是的，它们确实闪闪发光。你知道它的神奇之处吗？你认为建造它需要多长时间？”
"Yes, they shimmered all right. And you know the amazing thing about it? How long do you think it took to build it?"
“五十年，还是一百年？”
"Fifty years, a hundred years?"
“试建一年半。他们用五世纪的神奇材料：砖块建成了这座教堂。建成后，它是世界上最大的教堂。”
"Try a year and a half. They did it with the wonder material of the fifth century: brick. It was the largest church in the world when they finished it."
足球比赛于周日上午 8:30 在 C 场地举行，在网球场外。他们安排校内比赛在周日上午举行。这样周日下午和晚上就可以自由工作了。
The soccer game was at 8:30 Sunday morning on field C, beyond the tennis bubble. They schedule the intramural games for Sunday morning. That leaves Sunday afternoon and evening free for work.
校内活动在麻省理工学院非常盛行，是少数几个团体活动之一。团队代表各种团体，即支持结构。有些衬衫上印有兄弟会的希腊字母，有些印有实验室或研究生院的名称，有些印有国家名称——希腊、土耳其、智利、韩国，任何站在我们这一边并拥有工业基础的国家。
Intramurals are big at MIT-they're one of the few instances of group activity. Teams represent the various groups, the support structures. Some shirts had the Greek letters of fraternities embossed onto them, others the names of labs or graduate departments, and some the names of countries-Greece, Turkey, Chile, Korea, any country that's on our side and has an industrial base.
我们团队中那些在麻省理工学院工作了几年的人，穿着褪色的红色衬衫，胸前印着褪色的黄色卡路里。在他们攻读博士学位的后几年，也就是第四年、第五年、第六年、第七年，他们并没有像二十多岁的职业运动员那样优雅地老去。有几个人开始或已经脱发。超过一半的人戴眼镜；大肚腩很常见。我想知道麻省理工学院是否会对我做同样的事情。
The guys on our team who'd been at MIT for several years had faded red shirts with faded yellow Caloric written on the chest. Into the latter years, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, of their Ph.D. research, they hadn't as a rule aged as gracefully as professional athletes in their late twenties. Several had started or finished losing their hair. Over half wore glasses; potbellies were common. I wondered whether MIT would do the same to me.
我们十五个人站在 C 场地的边线上，看着 Aquanauts 队和 Dixie Chickens 队结束比赛。校内四个分区，A、B、C 和 D 联赛，以您在课堂上获得的成绩命名。A 联赛是最好的，主要由外国人组成；B 联赛是外国人加上一些运动员兄弟会；C 主要是实验室团队和兄弟会，外国人较少。D 联赛是宿舍联赛。
The fifteen of us stood on the sidelines of field C while the Aquanauts finished their game with the Dixie Chickens. The four intramural divisions, A-, B-, C-, and D-league, are named after the grades you get in your classes. A-league is the best, composed mostly of foreigners; B-league is foreigners plus some of the jockier frats; C is mostly lab teams and frats with lower concentrations of foreigners. D-league is for dorms.
我们的对手是来自河对岸的兄弟会 TEP。我们一开始就拼命战斗，而且跑得很快。TEP 还是本科生，他们还没有忘记怎么跑。我觉得自己处于两队中间——没有兄弟会的男生那么有活力，但肯定比许多 Calorics 的男生更有活力。
Our opponent was TEP, a frat from across the river. Once we started, we fought hard and passed well. TEP, as undergraduates, had not forgotten how to run. I felt in the middle of the two groups-not as vigorous as the frat boys but certainly more so than many of the Calorics.
天气晴朗，风很大，下半场风向对我们有利。左后卫罗宾在我距离球门 30 码处轻轻传球给我，我用左脚将球挑起。球飞了起来，飞了起来，风将球吹向球门，远角——但球击中横梁顶部，越过底线，TEP 踢出一记球门球。好吧，也许下次吧。
It was clear and windy and in the second half the wind was going our way. Robin, the left halfback, gave me a tap of a pass while I was 30 yards out from the goal and I chipped the ball with my left foot. Up, up, and away it went, the wind carrying it toward the goal, the far corner-but it hit the top of the crossbar, went past the end line, and TEP kicked a goal kick. Oh well, maybe next time.
最终我们仍以卡洛斯上半场的进球以 1-0 领先。我们大家手拉手围成一个圈，一起高呼“啦啦啦啦，TEP！”，向被击败的对手致敬。
In the end we were still ahead by 1-0 from the goal Carlos had scored in the first half. We all put our hands in a circle and shouted together, "Rah, rah, rah, TEP!" to salute our vanquished opponents.
我们几个人拿起自行车，走向 Lobdell 餐厅吃早餐。我把自行车锁在标志牌附近，上面写着“残疾人坡道：禁止自行车停放”；栏杆上还有三辆自行车，所以我觉得没问题。虽然是星期天早上，但我不想浪费时间寻找另一个停放自行车的地方。
Several of us picked up our bicycles and walked toward the Lobdell cafeteria for breakfast. I locked mine near the sign that read, HANDICAPPED RAMP: NO BICYCLE PARKING; there were three other bikes on the railing, so I figured it was all right. Even though it was Sunday morning I didn't want to waste time looking for another place to leave the bike.
我对卡洛斯说：“这一球踢得真好。你好像以前踢过足球。”
I said to Carlos, "That was a good shot. You seem to have played soccer before."
“是的，我在墨西哥上大学时也弹过一些曲子，”他说。他和我一样身材魁梧，头发乌黑，长度与 1965 年约翰·列侬的差不多。
"Yes, well, I played a little at university in Mexico," he said. He was husky like me and had dark hair about the length John Lennon's was in 1965.
我问他在麻省理工学院工作了多久，是否找到资金，是否认识有钱的教授。
I asked him how long he'd been at MIT, whether he'd found funding, whether he knew any professors who had money.
“去年春天我来到这里，”他说，“我获得了墨西哥政府的奖学金。只要我表现得足够好，我就能获得学生签证。我的论文题目是研究管道弯头中水滴对蒸汽管道的侵蚀。你知道吗？去年春天是我一生中最艰难的时期。我很难相信自己属于这里；我觉得我被录取可能只是侥幸。而我一直在想，我班上的每个人都一定比我聪明。如果每个人都比我聪明，那就意味着无论我考试成绩多好，我都会低于平均水平。如果我低于平均水平，我就会得 C，然后我就得回墨西哥城了。你知道我在说什么吗？”
"I came here last spring," he said, "on a scholarship from the Mexican government. As long as I do well enough to stay here I have a student visa. My thesis subject is a study of erosion in steam piping by water droplets in pipe elbows. You know something? Last spring was the toughest time I've had in my life. I had a hard time believing I belonged here; I thought maybe my being admitted was a fluke. And the whole time I am thinking that everybody in my classes must be smarter than I am. If everyone is smarter than I am, that means no matter how well I do on the test, I'll be below average. If I'm below average, I'll get C's and I'll be back in Mexico City. Do you know what I'm saying?"
“是的，我想我知道你在说什么，”我回答道。“我们来谈谈别的事吧。”
"Yes, I think I know what you're saying," I answered. "Let's talk about something else."
我们和桌子另一端的球员们一起自我吹嘘，回顾比赛的每一个细节。我们一致认为，无论是在进攻还是防守上，我们都需要更多地去追球。
We joined the self-congratulation of the guys at the other end of the table, the play-by-play of the game in review. We agreed on the need to go after the ball more both on offense and on defense.
我的目光穿过马萨诸塞大道，望向两座巨大的圆顶、即将结束绿色季节的树木，以及 7 号楼的爱奥尼亚柱。7 号楼挡住了绿色建筑的视线，所以我只能看到屋顶上的气象球和顶部装有频闪灯的梯子。7 号楼的檐口上刻有“麻省理工学院。威廉·巴顿·罗杰斯，创始人”。字母 U 看起来很像字母 V，因为 u 不是罗马人发明的。
My eyes wandered across Massachusetts Avenue to the two great domes, the trees nearing the end of their green season, and the Ionic columns of Building 7. Building 7 blocked the view of the Green Building, so I could just see the weather sphere on the roof, and the ladder with a strobe light on top. The cornice on Building 7 bore the inscription "Massachussetts Institute of Technology. William Barton Rogers, Founder." The u's looked like v's because the Romans didn't invent u's.
我不知道我是否可以和我的队友一起做研究，或者在我们一起上的课上取得 A 的成绩，但至少在足球方面，我处于正确的联盟中。
I didn't know whether I could do research with my team mates, or score A's in classes we might take together, but at least in soccer, I was in the right league.
星期一早上。办公桌上的传奇故事。夏洛特·埃文斯是机械工程系的秘书。她三十多岁，金发碧眼，魅力十足，优雅地老去，就像劳伦·白考尔。她的口音来自昆西，或者可能是斯托纳姆。
Monday morning. The saga of the desk. Charlotte Evans was the Mechanical Engineering secretary. She was in her late thirtiesblonde, attractive, and aging gracefully, like Lauren Bacall. Her accent was from Quincy or maybe Stoneham.
她的办公室是罗森诺的接待室。她对系里的规定和罗森诺或其他教授一样了解，甚至比他们更了解。我必须向夏洛特·埃文斯提出钥匙申请。她有一个印章，上面有罗森诺的签名，她有权用它来处理小问题。她有权决定什么是小问题，所以她几乎和罗森诺本人一样有权力。
Her office was the antechamber to Rohsenow's. She knew the department and its rules as well as or better than Rohsenow or any of the other professors. It was Charlotte Evans to whom I would have to make my request for a key. She had a rubber stamp with Rohsenow's signature on it and the authority to use it for the lesser issues. It was up to her to decide what was a lesser issue, so she had almost as much power as Rohsenow himself.
“我是马特·阿姆斯特朗的朋友，”我站在审判席前说道，“我还没有助理研究员，但马特说他的办公室里有一张空桌子。我刚离开技术和政策部门，所以在办公室这块我算是无人问津了。”
"I'm a friend of Matt Armstrong," I said, standing before the seat of judgment, "and I don't have an R.A. yet, but Matt said there's an extra desk in his office. I've just left Technology and Policy, so I'm kind of in no-man's-land in the desk department."
“首先你需要这个，”她轻快地说，拿出一叠装订好的复印件。“这是所有正在进行的研究项目的清单。你应该仔细看看这份清单，找出谁在你感兴趣的领域最有钱。这些家伙总是与他们的行业联系人和国防部或能源部的伙伴达成交易。有时他们需要立即的帮助，如果你继续缠着他们，最终你会在正确的时间出现在正确的地点，你会得到资金。另外，留意部门简报；有时他们会在那里发布他们的空缺职位。”她的自信和力量令人欣慰，几乎像母亲一样。
"First you need this," she said briskly, pulling out a stapled set of xeroxes. "This is a list of all the ongoing research projects. You should look through the list and find out who's got the most money in the area closest to what you're interested in. These guys are always closing on deals with their industry contacts and their buddies at the Department of Defense or Energy. Sometimes they need help right away, and if you keep hounding them, eventually you'll be in the right place at the right time and you'll get funding. Also, keep an eye on the department newsletter; sometimes they post their openings there." Her confidence and strength were comforting, almost motherly.
“现在我还有一件事要告诉你，”她继续说道，“这里的教授们可能很混蛋。但请记住，他们经历的困难比你多，并不意味着他们就是更好的人。”她从绿色金属文件盒里拿出两张橙色的索引卡，在每张卡上都打上我的名字；她在底部盖上罗森诺的签名。
"Now there's something else I should tell you," she continued. "The professors here can be jerks. But remember that just because they've made it through more hoops than you have, that doesn't make them better people." She took two orange index cards out of the little green metal file box and typed my name on each; she stamped Rohsenow's signature on the bottom.
“把房间号和锁上的号码填好，然后带到 E-51 号楼四楼的钥匙办公室。如果那里或实验室里有人给你找麻烦，就让他们来找我。”
"Fill these out with the room number and the numbers on the lock and take them to the key office on the fourth floor of Building E- 51. If anyone there or in the lab gives you any trouble, tell them to come talk to me."
身边有位有权势的人真好。
It was good to have a powerful person on my side.
星期一下午我去听了艾伦·格林的第一堂能源工程课。从课程目录的描述来看，这门课完全符合我对麻省理工学院的期望。
Monday afternoon I went to Allen Greene's first lecture on Energy Engineering. From its description in the catalog, this course was right on the money for what I wanted out of MIT.
他以一个例子开始演讲。“假设该国想要大规模生产酒精汽油，即玉米酒精和汽油的混合物。如果这样做，需要什么？你需要为拖拉机提供燃料来种植和收割玉米。你需要投资拖拉机。你还需要投资炼油厂来生产酒精。这些生产要素中的每一个都有内部和外部的经济影响。例如，其他谷物的价格可能会上涨，因为原本可以种植这些谷物的土地无法再耕种。这是一种微观经济现象，我们可以对其进行建模。
He started his lecture with an example. "Suppose that the country wants to go into gasohol, a mixture of corn-derived alcohol and gasoline, in a big way. If it did, what would be needed? You'd need fuel for the tractor to plant and harvest the corn. You'd need an investment in tractors. And you'd need an investment in refineries for the alcohol production. Each of these production factors has an internal and an external economic impact. For example, the price of other grains may go up as the fields that would have otherwise been planted with them are made unavailable. That's a microeconomic phenomenon, and we can model it.
“同样，我们可以利用各种组件的效率和这些组件的成本，对各种子系统中的过程进行建模。对设备的大量投资可能会推高某些材料的价格。我们也可以对此进行建模。然后，我们可以采用我们构建的所有模型，将它们链接起来，并测试它们对各种参数的敏感性。然后，我们作为决策者可以进行价值评估，以确定我们的研发资金应该投向何处——我们可以确定关键的限速问题是什么。”
"Similarly, we can model the processes within the various subsystems, using efficiencies of the various components and costs of those components. Heavy investments in equipment may drive up prices in certain materials. We can model that as well. Then we can take all the models that we've constructed, link them, and test them for sensitivities to various parameters. Then we as decision makers can make value assessments to determine where our research and development funding should go-we can determine what are the key rate-limiting problems."
对。了解模型是什么确实很有帮助。
Right. It would really help to know what a model is.
不过，听到这样一场务实的演讲还是不错的。格林身上有一种中西部人的朴实，一种现实主义的倾向，这一定部分归功于他担任联合碳化物公司研发副总裁的经历。
It was good, though, to hear such a practically oriented lecture. Greene had a sort of middlewestern down-to-earthiness about him, a real-world slant that must have been partly due to his stint as vice president for research and development at Union Carbide.
讲座结束后，我走上讲台，向他请教关于课程的建议。我说：“我对您教授的内容非常感兴趣，但是这学期我还有三门课，课业已经满了。您觉得我报您的课、旁听讲座、修不及格怎么样？这样我就可以用整个一月份的时间来完成课堂作业了。”
After the lecture, I went up to the podium to ask him for advice about the class. I said, "I'm really interested in what you're teaching, but I've got three other classes this term that are a full load. What would you think of my signing up for your class, auditing the lectures, and taking an incomplete. Then I could devote all of January to doing a project for the class work."
他回答道：“这听起来确实不太诚实。”
"That doesn't really sound honest," he answered.
“欢迎你旁听课程，不过如果你不做作业的话，旁听课程可能会浪费时间。你为什么不在一月份回到我的办公室，我们可以讨论一下你在春季学期在我的指导下做一个独立学习项目。”
"You're welcome to audit the class, although it might be a waste of time if you're not doing the homework. Why don't you come back to my office in January, and we can talk about your doing an independent study project under my direction in the spring term."
“听起来不错，”我说，“我现在就不上你的课了，几个月后再回来跟你谈谈。”
"That sounds good," I said. "I'll drop your class now and come back to talk to you in a few months."
10 月 6 日，星期二
Tuesday, October 6
我需要帮助解决 Thermo 中问题集 3 中的问题 4。问题集 1 中 60 道题中我答对了 48 道（我和 Matt 核对过答案，他提醒我错误占 15 分；我在 Gyftopoulos 的讲座中进行了更正）。在没有 Matt 帮助的情况下，我完成了问题集 2，答对了 50 道题中的 36 道。问题集点占总成绩的 15%，因此尽可能接近 100% 是个好主意。每道题大约需要 15 到 20 个小时，但测验会涉及更紧迫的时间压力，我可能会被难倒。问题集可以作为礼物点。
I needed help on Problem 4 of Problem Set 3 in Thermo. I'd had 48 out of 60 correct on Problem Set 1 (I'd checked my answers with Matt, and he'd tipped me off to 15 points worth of errors; I made the correction during Gyftopoulos's lecture). I'd done Problem Set 2 without help from Matt and had 36 out of 50. It would be a good idea to get as close as possible to 100 percent on the problem set points since they constituted 15 percent of the grade. Each ate up about fifteen to twenty hours, but the quizzes would involve more acute time pressure and I might choke on them. The problem sets could be gift points.
吉夫托普洛斯曾说过他的办公室门永远敞开，所以我决定接受他的邀请。他看起来很和蔼，就像霍普金斯大学的沃克教授一样。沃克教授教大一物理，鼓励学生到他的办公室问他们想问的任何问题。对他来说，没有愚蠢的问题。我以为吉夫托普洛斯也会这样。
Gyftopoulos had said his office door was always open, so I decided to take him up on it. He seemed kindly, like Professor Walker at Hopkins. Professor Walker taught freshman physics and encouraged students to come to his office and ask any question they wanted to. No question was too dumb for him. I expected the same with Gyftopoulos.
但这是研究生院，这是麻省理工学院。
But this was graduate school. And it was MIT.
现在是四点一刻，云层让天色看起来更像黄昏。外面开始变冷了。他的秘书敲了敲他家的窗户，吉夫托普洛斯示意我进去。他录完了一封给牛津大学同事的信。“我期待着在 1 月份马赛的核热力学会议上见到你。诚挚的，伊莱亚斯。”
It was quarter to four and the clouds made it seem more like dusk. It was beginning to be cold outside. His secretary knocked on the window in his door and Gyftopoulos motioned me in. He finished recording a letter to a colleague at Oxford. "And I'm looking forward to seeing you at the Nuclear Thermodynamics Conference in Marseilles in January. Sincerely, Elias."
我坐在他柚木书桌前的柚木椅上。他问道：“佩珀，你觉得麻省理工学院怎么样？”
I sat in the teak chair in front of his teak desk. He asked, "How are you finding MIT so far, Pepper?"
“我发现这项工作很有挑战性，尤其是在你的课程中。我花了很多时间在问题集上，十五到二十个小时。”
"I'm finding the work challenging, especially in your course. I'm spending a lot of time on the problem sets, fifteen or twenty hours."
“那很好。我对习题集进行评分的原因之一就是鼓励学生更多地学习我的课程而不是其他课程。我觉得掌握热力学的基本原理对于一名优秀的工程师来说是必不可少的。现在，我今天具体能为您做些什么？”他问道。
"That's good. One of the reasons I have the problem sets graded is to encourage students to work on my class more than on their others. I feel that mastery of the fundamentals of thermodynamics is essential for a good engineer. Now, what specifically can I do for you today?" he asked.
“嗯，我对三块温度不同的金属块的问题有点困惑。问题是，如果你以最有效的方式将热量从一块金属转移到另一块金属块，那么其中一块金属块可以达到的最高温度是多少。我真的不知道从哪里开始，我想知道你是否能帮忙，”我说。
"Well, I'm having a little trouble with the problem with the three blocks of metal at three different temperatures. This is the one where you ask that if you move heat from one to another in the most efficient way possible, what is the maximum temperature one of the blocks can reach. I don't really know where to start with this and I wondered whether you could help," I said.
我希望他能给我一两个提示，告诉我如何设置这个问题。例如，他可能会告诉我先拿两个温度较低的块，冷却一个，加热另一个，然后对最热的那个和我刚刚加热的那个做同样的事情。或者这个问题可能还有其他技巧。我只是想要一个提示。
I hoped he would just give me a clue or two as to how to set up the problem. For example, he might tell me first to take the two lower-temperature blocks and cool one and heat the other, then do the same thing with the one that was first hottest and the one that I just heated up. Or there might be some other trick to the problem. I just wanted a hint.
“这不是一个简单的问题，”吉夫托普洛斯说。“事实上，我的同事，牛津大学的克拉克教授刚刚向《热力学杂志》提交了一篇论文，其中提出了这个问题的解决方案。我同意他的解决方案；我很想知道班上是否有人能提出他得出的结论。”
"It is not an easy problem," Gyftopoulos said. "In fact, my colleague, Professor Clarke at Oxford, has just submitted a paper with a solution to that problem in it to the Journal of Thermodynamics. I agree with his solution; I'm interested to see whether anyone in the class comes up with what he arrived at."
太好了，我想。克拉克教授同一周还有另外四道题要交吗？
Great, I thought. Did Professor Clarke have four other problems due the same week?
吉夫托普洛斯继续说道：“佩珀，你为什么不去黑板前呢？我想问你几个问题。它们也许能给你指明正确的方向。”
Gyftopoulos continued, "Why don't you go to the blackboard, Pepper. I'd like to ask you a few questions. They may lead you in the right direction."
哎呀。我以为苏格拉底式教学法只适用于法学院和商学院。我想要的只是一点提示，而不是即兴的口试。
Uh-oh. I thought the Socratic method was reserved for law school and business school. All I wanted was a hint, not an impromptu oral exam.
当我从布满灰尘的铝制托盘中拿起一支粉笔时，他问道：“请为我定义可用能量。”
As I picked up a piece of chalk from the dusty aluminum tray, he asked, "Please define for me available energy."
说什么？那是三周前的事了。考试还有三周才开始。他不能指望我从笔记中复习到第二堂课。救命。救我出去。
Say what? That's from three weeks ago. The test isn't for three weeks. He can't expect me to have reviewed that from my notes to the second lecture. Help. Get me out of here.
我回答说：“可用能量是……可用于做有用功的能量。”我只记得课堂笔记中有好几页是专门讲这个概念的。我读过一次，打算在期中考试之前让马特、贝雷塔或吉夫托普洛斯给我解释一下。
I answered, "The available energy is the energy that is .. . available to do useful work." All I remembered was that several pages of the class notes were devoted to the concept. I'd read them once and had intended to get Matt or Beretta or Gyftopoulos to explain them to me before the midterm.
吉夫托普洛斯不肯罢休。“我需要一个比这更严格的定义，”他说。
Gyftopoulos would not let up. "I need a more rigorous definition than that," he said.
我在黑板上画了一个倒置的马蹄铁，代表大写希腊字母 omega。最后一个字母。我试图记住 Gyftopoulos 在第三堂课开始时在黑板上写下的不等式。
I drew an upside-down horseshoe on the board, for the capital Greek letter omega. The last letter. I tried to remember the equation with the inequality that Gyftopoulos had written on the board at the beginning of the third lecture.
它开始回升。欧米茄减欧米茄零下大于或等于 T 零下乘以 S 减 S 零下。
It began to come back. Omega minus omega-sub-zero is greater than or equal to T-sub-zero multiplied by S minus S-subzero.
他试探性地问道：“S 指的是什么？”
"What does S refer to?" he probed.
答案很简单：“熵。”
An easy one. "Entropy."
“请定义熵。”
"Please define entropy."
这个问题很难回答。“熵，嗯，嗯，它与随机性有关，嗯，与系统做功的能力以及系统的温度有关。”
A hard one. "Entropy is well, it's, uh, well, it has to do with randomness and, uh, the system's ability to do work and sort of how hot it is."
他不再微笑了。“你显然没有为这次会议做好准备，”他严厉地说。“我是个大忙人，如果你没有做好准备，你的问题也没有很好地组织起来，请不要再来这里了。”
He wasn't smiling anymore. "You're obviously not prepared for this session," he said sternly. "I'm a very busy man, and if you are not prepared and you do not have your questions wellformulated, please do not come here again."
别哭，我心想。大男孩不会哭。如果我哭了，他再也不会用同样的眼光看我了。不过我太累了。外面越来越黑了。我欠债了。我不知道该怎么对待斯蒂芬妮。
Don't cry, I thought. Big boys don't cry. He'll never look at me the same if I cry. I'm so tired, though. It's getting darker outside. I'm in debt. I don't know what to do about Stephanie.
泪水和哭泣声从我的身体涌到我的头上，然后从我的眼睛、嘴巴和鼻子涌出。
The tears and sobs welled up from my body to my head and out my eyes, mouth, and nose.
“如果…如果…如果。”我说不出来。
"If . . . if ... if." I couldn't say it.
如果我知道如何提出这个问题，那么不用你我也可以回答它。
If I knew how to formulate the question, I could answer it without you.
“好了，好了，没必要了，”他稍微同情地说道。“去洗漱一下，然后坐下来休息几分钟。然后我们再讨论这个问题。”
"Now, now, there's no need for that," he said a little more compassionately. "Go and wash yourself and sit down for a few minutes. Then we can go over the problem."
我走过等候区的贝雷塔和秘书。我尽量避免目光接触。他们似乎并没有因为我的红脸而感到不安。也许他们以前见过这样的场景。
I walked past Beretta and the secretary in the waiting area. I tried to avoid eye contact. They didn't seem disturbed by my red face. Maybe they'd seen scenes like this before.
我洗去眼中的盐分，坐在一个隔间里，身上还穿着牛仔裤，门关上了。我深吸了几口气。然后我回到他的办公室拿我的笔记本。
I washed the salt from my eyes and sat in one of the stalls with my blue jeans still on and the door closed. I took some deep breaths. I went back to pick up my notebook from his office.
Gian Paolo 坐在另一张柚木椅子上，和 Gyftopoulos 交谈。Gian Paolo 递给我一张问题开头的草图，他们两人向我解释了如何开始。
Gian Paolo was sitting in the other teak chair, talking to Gyftopoulos. Gian Paolo handed me a sketch of the beginning of the problem, and the two of them explained how to start.
他们今天枪杀了萨达特。当子弹穿过他的身体时，他像往常一样挺起胸膛，立正站立，一副反抗的样子。
They shot Sadat today. As the bullets ripped apart his body he stood, as always, at attention, chest out, defiant.
10 月 8 日，星期四，晚上 9:00
Thursday, October 8. 9:00 P.m.
距离 Rohsenow 课上的第一次测验还有 16 个小时。这将是我是否适合麻省理工学院的第一个指标。学习的方法是通读笔记，通读教科书，但那只是肥料。准备考试的方法是做题，即使没有评分作业。
T minus sixteen hours to the first quiz in Rohsenow's class. It will be the first indicator of whether or not I belong at MIT. The way to study is to read through the notes, read through the textbook, but that is just fertilizer. The way to prepare for the test is to do problems, even though there is no graded homework.
如果每章后面有一份问题解答手册就好了。这样我就可以尝试解答这个问题，遇到困难时，在别人已经解决的解决方案中寻找提示，再次遇到困难时，再寻找另一个提示，如此反复。这就是我完成本科课程的方法。
It would be nice if there were a solution manual to the problems, in the back of the chapter. Then I could try the problem, get stuck, look for a hint in the solution that someone else had worked out, get stuck again, look for another hint, and so on. That's how I'd gotten through my undergrad classes.
看了足够多的类似问题，你就会开始发现规律。了解规律，你就能把一些东西写到试卷上。那么至少你可以得到部分分数，当评分员给你 10 分中的 3 分（如果你写下相关公式），3 分（如果你尝试将问题的具体参数代入公式），如果你得到……答案，再加 4 分。
Look at enough similar problems and you begin to see patterns. Know the patterns and you have something to put on the paper. Then at least you can get partial credit points, when the grader gives you 3 out of 10 for putting down a relevant formula, 3 for making an attempt at plugging the specific parameters of the problem into the formula, and 4 more points if you get ... the answer.
在麻省理工学院，模式就少得多。每个问题似乎都有 100 个步骤，每个步骤似乎都很微妙，这让杰米解决问题的能力看起来像是随心所欲、神奇或上天赐予的礼物。是时候尝试另一个了。
Here at MIT there were fewer patterns. Every problem seemed to have 100 steps, and each step seemed to have a subtlety to it that made Jamie's ability to solve them seem arbitrary, magic, or a gift from above. Time to try another one.
“附加问题 7。求出距离平板前缘 2 英尺处的温度，该平板宽度无限大，长度无限大，且上面有均匀的水流。传到平板的热通量是均匀的，为每平方英尺 4,000 Btu。
"Extra Problem 7. Find the temperature 2 feet from the leading edge of a flat plate that is infinitely wide, infinitely long, and has a uniform flow of water going over it. The heat flux to the plate is uniform, at 4,000 Btu per square foot.
是的。我很好奇为什么有人会关心一个无限长、无限宽的平板。我见过的最大的盘子是圆形的，放在一个 20 英寸的披萨下面。这个问题似乎和让我成为非物理学家的无限长的均匀电荷圆柱一样晦涩难懂。
Right. I wondered why anyone would care about a flat plate that was infinitely long and infinitely wide. The biggest plate I'd ever seen was round and underneath a 20-inch pizza. This problem seemed almost as obscure as the infinitely long cylinder of uniform charge that made me into a nonphysicist.
我开始尝试。步骤1.画图。
I started my attempt. Step 1. Draw picture.
无论如何，什么能给你均匀的热流呢？如果热流均匀，为什么温度不均匀？比尔猫会说，噓噓。
What would give you uniform heat flux anyway? If the heat flux is uniform, why isn't the temperature uniform? Ack-ack, as Bill the Cat would say.
第 2 步。在书中寻找类似的示例问题。没有一个是接近的。
Step 2. Look for similar sample problem in book. There isn't one that's even close.
步骤 3. 翻阅办公室同事书架上的四本不同的热转印书。Rohsenow 昨天说，我们可以把任何我们想看的书拿去测试。“唯一不能带的东西，”他眨眨眼说道，“就是顾问。”里面也没什么内容。
Step 3. Look through four different heat transfer books on office mate's shelf. Rohsenow said yesterday that we could bring to the test any book we wanted to. "The only thing you can't bring," he said with a wink, "is a consultant." There's nothing in them, either.
步骤 4. 浏览课堂笔记，然后浏览同事去年课堂笔记。又一个死胡同。
Step 4. Look through class notes, then office mate's class notes from previous year's lecture. Another dead end.
步骤 5. 思考问题中发生了什么。参考图。重新绘制图片。
Step 5. Think about what's going on in the problem. Refer to the picture. Redraw the picture.
也许两个无穷大的意义在于简化问题，这样你就不必担心边缘会发生什么。这将使问题得到解决，就好像事物只在两个方向上变化，即在一个平面上。
Maybe the point of the two infinities is to simplify the problem so you don't have to worry about what happens at edges. This will enable the problem to be solved as if things vary in two directions only, i.e., in a plane.
我仍然想知道什么会产生均匀的热流，以及它为什么重要。然后我在《马特环球报》头版上看到了关于西布鲁克核电站的文章。在板下分裂的原子可能看起来像是均匀的热流。
I still wondered what would produce a uniform heat flux and why it mattered. Then I saw the article about the Seabrook nuclear plant on the front page of Matt's Globe. Atoms splitting underneath the plate might appear to be a uniform heat flow.
水或其他冷却剂必须流过钢板顶部。否则钢板（无论由什么制成）都会融化。二五五班的中国综合症。
Water or some other coolant would have to flow over the top of the plate. Otherwise the plate, no matter what it was made of, would melt. The China syndrome in class Two fifty-five.
如果水从左边流来，而板块非常非常热，比水还热，那么板块左端的水会最冷，离板块越远，水就会越热。水越热，冷却板块的能力就越弱。因此，越往下游，板块就越热。
If the water is coming from the left, and the plate is really really hot, hotter than the water, then the water will be coolest at the left end of the plate, and more of it will get hotter farther and farther away from the plate. The hotter the water is, the less it can cool the plate. Ergo, the plate gets hotter as you go downstream.
他们在核电站必须采取的正确措施是确保盘子不会太长，以免其温度超过其材质的熔点。谁会想吃像沙滩球一样大的西红柿？
The trick they have to get right at the nuke plant is to make sure the plate isn't so long that its temperature goes above the melting point of what it's made of. Who would want to eat a tomato as big as a beach ball?
但等等。Rohsenow 就是他们。如果我能想出如何解决这个问题，我就是他们。
But wait. Rohsenow is they. If I can figure out how to do this problem, I am they.
当我开始设定配方时，看门人艾迪敲了敲门，进来倒垃圾。艾迪和尼凯斯先生有着惊人的相似之处，尼凯斯先生是比利时传热实验室的技术人员，他参与了我实验的一部分。这有点像《绿野仙踪》中的稻草人、胆小狮子和铁皮人与艾姆婶婶的农场工人的相似之处。艾迪出生在西西里岛。
As I started setting up the formula, Eddy the janitor knocked on the door and came in to empty the wastebasket. Eddy had an uncanny resemblance to Monsieur Nicaise, the technician who built parts of my experiment in the heat transfer lab in Belgium. It seemed a little like the resemblance that the Scarecrow, the Cowardly Lion, and the Tin Man had to Aunty Em's farmhands in The Wizard of Oz. Eddy was born in Sicily.
“最近怎么样，佩皮？你来得有点晚了，不是吗？”我的名字在意大利语中听起来像佩皮。
"How's it going, Peppy? You're here kind of late, aren't you?" My name sounds like Peppy in Italian.
“现在才十一点，夜色还很浓，”我说，“明天我要参加第一场考试，我想尽可能做好准备。”
"It's only eleven. The night is young," I said. "I've got my first test tomorrow and I want to be as prepared as possible."
他回答说：“不要太沉迷于工作。有时要找点乐子。有些研究生只工作了五年，也许最后他们的实验没有成功，他们没有拿到硕士或博士学位。他们一定觉得他们浪费了这么多年，生活毫无意义。我的一些清洁工同事发现这些学生在他们应该打扫的办公室里吊在管道上。这毁了他们的工作。不要让这种事情发生在你身上。”
He answered, "Don't get too wrapped up in your work. Have some fun sometimes. Some of these graduate students just work for five years-then maybe at the end their experiment doesn't work and they don't get their master's or Ph.D. They must feel like they wasted all those years and there's nothing left to live for. Some of my janitor colleagues have found these students hanging from the pipe in the offices they're supposed to clean up. It ruins their shift. Don't let it happen to you."
这是真的。我从认识麻省理工学院学生的人那里听说过麻省理工学院的自杀问题，但我把这些知识抛在一边，忘掉了。我想知道我认识的或还不认识的谁可能活不下来。或者那个人是我。
It's true. I'd heard about MIT's suicide problem from people who knew people who went here, but I'd shoved the knowledge aside and forgotten about it. I wondered who I knew, or didn't yet know, who might not survive. Or whether it was me.
“我会尽量保持客观，”我向他保证。“你知道附近有哪些办公室里有沙发吗？我不想浪费今晚骑自行车回家和明天早上再骑自行车回来的时间。”
"I'll try to keep things in perspective," I assured him. "Do you know of any offices around that have couches in them? I don't want to waste the time it'll take to ride my bike home tonight and back in tomorrow morning."
“当然可以。走廊尽头就有一家。去 5 号楼找我就行。”
"Sure. There's one just down the hall. Just find me in Building 5."
“好的。现在我想换个环境。我要去学生中心图书馆待几个小时，”我说。
"OK. For now I want a change of scenery. I'm going to the student center library for a couple of hours," I said.
学生中心图书馆全天 24 小时开放。它位于学生中心的五楼。桌子是棕色的贴面；椅子是人造革的。电动工具半夜就放在这里。这也是一些麻省理工学院学生的住所。一些小凹室非常暗，他们在椅子下面或某个小隔间里放着牙刷和剃须刀。至少刷牙和刮胡子的人会这样。在这里睡觉的诀窍是把两张躺椅对面摆放，然后靠在一张躺椅的扶手上，腿放在另一张躺椅的座位上。
The student center library is open twenty-four hours a day. It's on the fifth floor of the student center. The tables are brown veneer; the chairs are Naugahyde. This is where the power tools go in the middle of the night. It is also where some MIT students live. Some little alcoves are pretty dark, and underneath the chairs or in a cubbyhole somewhere they keep their toothbrushes and razors. At least the ones who brush their teeth and shave do. The trick to sleeping here is to put two of the lounge chairs across from each other and lean on the arm of one with your legs on the seat of the other.
学生中心图书馆位于五楼，但看不到运动场。虽然有窗户，但窗户对着混凝土人行道和外墙。这是为了防止你在连续八次通宵工作后将一把 Naugahyde 椅子扔出窗户并跟着它。
The student center library is on the fifth floor, but there isn't a view of the playing fields. There are windows, but they look onto a concrete sidewalk and exterior wall. This is to prevent you from lobbing one of the Naugahyde chairs through the window and following it after your eighth consecutive all-nighter.
我发现桌子对面有一把空椅子，对面是一位东方学生，他正在阅读一本名为《半导体物理学》的教科书。他用脚以半随机的节奏敲击椅子腿，每秒一两次。与此同时，他每敲击十英尺，就把笔像指挥棒一样从小指转到大拇指，再转回来。
I found an empty chair at a table across from an Oriental student who was reading a textbook entitled Semiconductor Physics. He tapped his foot on the chair leg in a semirandom rhythm, once or twice a second. At the same time he twirled his pen like a baton from his little finger to his thumb and back again every ten foot taps.
这让他很难集中注意力。“不好意思，你能不能别再这样了？”我问他。
It made it difficult to concentrate. "Excuse me, would you mind stopping that?" I asked him.
“阻止什么？”
"Stopping what?"
“算了。”我走到另一张桌子旁，一直学习到 1:30。当我意识到自己已经看了 Rohsenow 的一张讲义十五分钟时，我知道该停下来了。看着它，就好像它是一张对我毫无意义的中文书，只是纸上的记号。我睁着眼睛睡着了。
"Never mind." I went to another table and studied until 1:30. I knew it was time to stop when I realized I had been looking at one sheet of Rohsenow's lecture notes for fifteen minutes. Looking at it as if it were a sheet of Chinese writing that meant nothing to me, just marks on a page. I was asleep with my eyes open.
凌晨 2:00
2:00 A. M.
我问另一个看门人是否见过艾迪。
I asked another janitor whether he'd seen Eddy.
“他吃午饭了。”我猜如果你上班时间为 10:00 到 6:30，那么凌晨 2:00 就是午饭时间了。我走向办公室，发现艾迪从门厅的壁橱里拿出一把拖把和一个擦洗桶。他打开了办公室的门，里面放着一张早期的美国沙发。我从门内侧的挂钩上取下两件实验室夹克，把它们当作午睡的毯子。
"He's at lunch." I guess if you work the 10:00 to 6:30 shift, 2:00 A.M. would be lunchtime. I went toward my office and found Eddy pulling a mop and scrub bucket out of the hall closet. He opened the door to the office with the early American couch. I took two lab jackets off the hook on the inside of the door and used them as blankets for my nap.
6:15 时，艾迪再次敲门。“来，佩皮，我给你泡了一杯卡布奇诺。就像我妈妈做的一样。一点浓缩咖啡，很多糖和牛奶。现在你又可以开始学习了，好好考试吧。”
At 6:15 Eddy knocked on the door again. "Here, Peppy, I made you a cappucino. Just like my mama makes. A little espresso and a lot of sugar and milk. Now you get going again in your studying and do well on that test."
下午 2:00，考试在教室开始，我们二十个人用椅子扶手上的小写字板在蓝皮书上写字。Rohsenow 参加了 Dynatech 董事会议，而 Jamie 大部分时间都在外面。专业人士不会作弊。问题 1 出奇地简单，只用了 20 分钟。问题 2 有点像我昨晚做的那个，所以至少我有东西可以写在试卷上。还没有被击中，我的头还在水面上。
At 2:00 P.M. the test began in the classroom with the twenty of us using our little deskettes from the chair arms to write in our bluebooks. Rohsenow was at a Dynatech directors' meeting and Jamie left the room for most of the test. Professionals do not cheat. Problem 1 was surprisingly easy and took twenty minutes. Problem 2 was a little like the one I'd done last night, so at least I had something to put on the paper. Not yet torpedoed, my head was still above water.
10 月 9 日晚上 8:00
8:00 P.m. October 9
又一个星期五晚上，我没有人。我也没有钱，因为我没有拿到工资。
Another Friday night and I don't got nobody. Ain't got no money 'cause I don't get paid.
外面越来越冷了。带烟灰缸的装饰台灯温暖了我的脸和手。这是唯一的一盏灯，它在书桌深绿色的吸墨纸上形成一滩柔和的光线。上面的荧光灯嗡嗡作响。
It was getting colder outside. The deco desk lamp with builtin ashtray warmed my face and my hands. The only lamp, it made a pool of soft light on the writing tablet on the desk's dark green blotter. The fluorescent light above buzzed too much.
1981 年 10 月 9 日，星期五
"Friday, October 9, 1981
亲爱的斯蒂芬妮，
Dear Stephanie,
……如你所知，我父亲已经 70 多岁了，身体有些问题。也许我邀请你结婚的部分原因是为了取悦他，趁他还活着的时候结婚。我不想伤害你。我希望有一天你能从心底原谅我……
. . . As you know, my father, now over seventy, has had some health problems. Maybe part of why I asked you was to please him, to be married while he was still with us. I didn't want to hurt you. I hope you will someday find it in your heart to forgive me.... ..
“咚”，7 号楼大厅的邮箱里传来回音。 飞机飞往布鲁塞尔。
Thunk, echoed the mailbox in the Building 7 lobby. Par avion, to Brussels.
章节
C H A P T E R
4
4
期中考试
Midterm
哥伦布日天气晴朗，微风徐徐，阳光明媚，查尔斯河上停满了帆船。吉姆·斯图尔特和我在纪念大道中间看着这些帆船，等待着 10,000 名参加邦妮贝尔帆船赛的女性通过。
Columbus Day was clear, windy, and warm with Indian summer sun, and the Charles was full of sailboats. Jim Stuart and I watched them from the middle of Memorial Drive while we waited for the 10,000 women to pass in the Bonnie Belle race.
他们以各种速度驶过。他们每个人都是美国自由思想家。
They passed at all speeds. They were American-free thinkers, every one of them.
10 月 15 日，星期四
Thursday, October 15
我坐在吉夫托普洛斯班第三排玛丽·帕特森旁边。她穿着褪色的牛仔裤和黑色 T 恤，胸前有一个骷髅头。骷髅头上绘有美国国旗的星条旗，下面用大字母写着“运动死亡”。牙齿的形状隐约像字母，上面写着“只有生命才能杀死你”。
I sat next to Mary Patterson in the third row in Gyftopoulos's class. She wore faded jeans and a black T-shirt with a skull on the front. The skull had the stars and stripes of the American flag on it and "Sport Death" written in big letters beneath. The teeth were shaped faintly like letters, and they spelled "Only life can kill you."
“这件 T 恤真有趣，”我说，“你是在哪儿买的？”
"That's an interesting T-shirt," I said. "Where'd you get it?"
“我本科时住在 Senior House。这是宿舍的标志。”
"I was in Senior House as an undergrad. This is the dorm logo."
“有一场比赛，谁赢了？”
"Was there a contest and that won?"
“我不知道整个历史，”她说。“我认为有人从亨特·汤普森的一本书的封面上抹去了骷髅。至于‘体育死亡’，我不知道是否有人知道它从何而来。”
"I don't know the full history," she said. "I think somebody swiped the skull off the cover of some book by Hunter Thompson. As for the 'Sport Death,' I don't know if anyone knows where that started."
“Senior House听起来是个很有趣的地方。你上过麻省理工学院吗？”我问她。
"Senior House sounds like a fun place. Did you go to MIT?I asked her.
“是的，我是 1978 年毕业的。过去三年我一直在 Dynatech 工作。但似乎如果我想成为研发领域的大人物，我至少需要硕士学位，最好是博士学位。否则我只能干咖啡工作了。”
"Yeah, I graduated in '78. I've worked at Dynatech for the past three years. But it seemed that if I wanted to be a big wheel in research and development I needed at least a master's and preferably a Ph.D. Otherwise I could get stuck running coffee."
我问她是否喜欢 Dynatech。
I asked her how she liked Dynatech.
她回答说：“这很好。他们给所有工程师提供私人办公室——好吧，虽然没有窗户，但这比我一些在航空航天业工作的朋友所住的‘猪圈’要好得多。而且工作真的很有趣。”
She answered, "It's really good. They give all the engineers private offices-well, okay, none of them has windows but it's better than the 'pigpens' that some of my friends who got jobs in aerospace work in. And the work is really interesting."
“猪圈是什么？”
"What's a pigpen?"
“这就是那些在那些有成排办公桌的大型开放式办公室里工作的工程师们的称呼。那里没有隐私，很难集中注意力。那里的诀窍是要足够明亮，这样你才能得到一间有门的室外办公室，”她说。
"That's what the engineers who work in those big open offices with rows and rows of desks call them. There's no privacy, and it's really hard to concentrate. The trick there is to shine enough so you get one of the outside offices with a door," she said.
我还没有真正的工作过，所以这个消息让我很不安。
I hadn't yet worked in a real job, so this was disturbing news.
我对她说：“我想知道现在转学去法学院是不是太晚了。”她笑了。“顺便说一句，”我补充道，“我喜欢你的戒指。你是在哪儿买的？”
I said to her, "I wonder whether it's too late to transfer to law school." She laughed. "By the way," I added, "I like your ring. Where'd you get it?"
“这是我的铜鼠，”她说。这是一枚印章戒指，印章是一只海狸，麻省理工学院的吉祥物。“这让我想起，现在我回到学校，握拳时必须把戒指转过来，这样印章才能抵住我的手掌。”
"This is my brass rat," she said. It was a signet ring, with a beaver, the MIT mascot, as the signet. "That reminds me, now that I'm back in school here, I have to turn the ring around so the signet's against my palm when I make a fist."
“为什么呢？”我问。
"Why's that?" I asked.
“当你在这里时，海狸把你当作厕所。当你获得学位后，你就和海狸融为一体了，所以你把戒指转过来，你和海狸就把世界其他地方当作厕所了，”她说。
"When you're here, the beaver uses you as a toilet. After you get your degree, you're one with the beaver, so you turn the ring around and you and the beaver use the rest of the world as a toilet," she said.
我至少能看出这个比喻的前半部分是合理的。玛丽和 TPP 的人一样自信，但她更聪明。在这里读四年本科可能会让人产生这种感觉。她的自信让我有点害怕，但她的眼神里也流露出温柔。我希望我们能成为朋友。
I could see the validity of at least the first part of the metaphor. Mary had the same confidence that the TPP people had, but she was smarter. Four years of undergrad work here probably does that to a person. Her confidence scared me a little, but there was also a gentleness in her eyes. I hoped we would become friends.
吉夫托普洛斯开始了当天的讲座。到目前为止，他的演讲完全是外语。他和贝雷塔介绍了他们自己的热力学语言，包括“可用能量”、“稳定平衡状态”和“第一和第二类永动机”等新术语。今天关于麦克斯韦关系的讲座与我在霍普金斯大学听到的类似。
Gyftopoulos started the lecture of the day. Up until now the presentation was completely foreign. He and Beretta had presented their own language of thermodynamics, including new terms like "available energy," "stable equilibrium state," and "perpetual motion machines of the first and second kind." Today the lectureon Maxwell's relations-was similar to one I'd heard at Hopkins.
麦克斯韦关系式是由 19 世纪英国物理学家詹姆斯·克拉克·麦克斯韦发明或发现的，他还发明或发现了麦克斯韦方程，该方程描述了电场和磁场之间的关系。这些 19 世纪的人无所不能。继瓦特发动机、卡诺理论和克劳修斯熵之后，麦克斯韦提出了关系式，这些关系式使你能够利用温度、压力和体积等可测量量，计算出能量和熵等更抽象的量的大小。
Maxwell's relations were invented or discovered by James Clerk Maxwell, the nineteenth-century British physicist who also invented or discovered Maxwell's equation for the relationship between electric and magnetic fields. Those nineteenth-century guys did everything. After Watt's engine, after Carnot's theory, after Clausius's entropy, Maxwell came along with relations that enable you to take measurable quantities like temperature, pressure, and volume and figure out the magnitude of the more abstract quantities, like energy and entropy.
所以今天的讲座介绍了麦克斯韦关系。它们都是偏导数。例如，熵，不管它是什么，都是温度和压力的函数，因此，熵的微小变化可以被认为是温度微小变化对熵的影响和压力微小变化对熵的影响的总和。很简单。但是当你再看能量的相同分析，以及他们称之为焓的另一个东西，当他们在一个半小时内把所有这些都抛给你时，它很快就会变得一团糟。你的笔记中有如此多的方程式，以至于你几乎不可能知道哪些是重要的，中间步骤是什么，以及它们是如何组合在一起的。一切都进行得如此之快，光是写下来就已经够难的了，更不用说理解任何东西并遵循推理了。
And so today's lecture presented Maxwell's relations. They were all partial derivatives. Since, for example, entropy, whatever that is, is a function of temperature and pressure, a very small change in entropy can be thought of as the sum of a small change in temperature's effect on entropy and a small change in pressure's effect on entropy. Simple enough. But when you then look at the same analysis for energy, and another thing they call enthalpy, and when they shoot all this at you in an hour and a half, it quickly becomes soup. There are so many equations in your notes that it's nearly impossible to know what the important ones are, what the intermediate steps are, and how they all fit together. It all goes so fast and it's hard enough just to write the stuff down, much less comprehend anything and follow the reasoning.
玛丽的笔记非常整洁，就像马特的一样，简洁实用。她甚至有时间在空白处画一些小叶子植物。
Mary's notes were perfectly neat, like Matt's, uncluttered and useful. She even had time to draw little leafed plants in the margins.
讲座结束时，吉夫托普洛斯做了最后总结。“我刚才介绍的内容正是你们在物理化学课或热力学物理课上看到的。这是科学知识。然而，在现实世界中，你会发现科学知识是最简单的部分。至少它在逻辑上是一致和不变的。作为工程师，你必须对所设计的系统做出假设。做出让你能够生产出符合科学原理的有用东西的假设是非常困难的。”
At the end of the lecture, Gyftopoulos made a final note. "What I've just presented is exactly what you will see in a physical chemistry class, or a physics class in thermodynamics. This is scientific knowledge. What you will find, though, in the real world is that the scientific knowledge is the easy part. At least it is logically consistent and invariant. What you will have to do as engineers is make assumptions about the systems you are designing. Making assumptions that enable you to produce something that works while being consistent with the scientific principles can be very difficult."
我不明白他的意思。
I wondered what he meant.
“顺便说一下，”他继续说道，“第一次测验将在 10 月 29 日举行，也就是两周后。”
"By the way," he continued, "the first quiz will be October 29, two weeks from today."
我对玛丽说：“这个日期让我想起了一些事情，但我记不清了，好像那是某个历史事件的日期。”
I said to Mary, "That date rings a bell with me, but I can't place it, like it's the date of some historic event."
“试试1929年的黑色星期四，股市崩盘。”
"Try Black Thursday 1929, the stock market crash."
“你的记忆力真好。你午餐吃什么了吗？”我问道。
"You've got a great memory. Are you doing anything for lunch?" I asked.
“我要去检查我的车，”她用不拒绝的语气回答道。“也许下次吧。”
"I'm getting my car inspected," she replied in a nonrejecting tone. "Maybe some other time."
星期五下午我去上流体教程。这是在 1 号楼二楼，由来自黎巴嫩的 Kamel Gemayel 讲授。在教程中，你会问一些如何解决问题的问题。这也是你让教授出丑的机会，这很公平，因为他们有很多机会让你出丑。不过，Gemayel 是个好人，所以没人想让他出丑。
Friday afternoon I went to the fluids tutorial. This was conducted on the second floor of Building 1, by Kamel Gemayel, from Lebanon. At a tutorial, you ask questions about how to do problems. It's also your chance to make the professor look stupid, which is only fair since they have so many chances to make you look stupid. Gemayel was a nice guy, though, so nobody wanted to make him look stupid.
1 号楼毗邻纪念大道，教室的窗户正对着大道两边的树叶。窗外是蓝天白云的下午，树叶金黄灿烂，查尔斯河上的风和周一一样，只是更凉快了。秋天已经完全来临，天气再暖和的机会不多了。海浪让我回想起划独木舟的日子。
Building 1 adjoins Memorial Drive and the classroom's window looked right onto leaf level of the trees along each side of the drive. It was a blue sky afternoon through the window and the leaves were brilliantly golden and the wind blew on the Charles as it had on Monday, only cooler. Fall was fully with us, with little chance for more warm weather. The waves made me think back to my canoe-tripping days.
杰马耶勒提出了 C-32 问题。油和水夹在两块板之间，波浪沿着板的长度移动。板当然是无限长的。问题要求你将波速与油和水的密度以及波浪的高度联系起来。他从笔记中推导出解决方案。这不是湖上的波浪，但它是一个开始。
Gemayel presented problem C-32. Oil and water were between two plates, and a wave of the water moved down the length of the plates. Naturally the plates were infinitely long. The problem asked you to relate the wave speed to the density of the oil and the water and the height of the wave. He went through the derivation of the solution from his notes. It wasn't a wave on a lake, but it was a start.
我旁边的利比亚核工程专业学生让杰马耶勒做 C-33 题；这道题要求我们计算给定尺寸的船舶在给定大小的海浪中的振动频率。这是一道今年新加的题目，所以杰马耶勒没有书面解决方案。事实上，他以前从未研究过这道题。
The Libyan nuclear engineering student next to me asked Gemayel to do problem C-33; it asked us to calculate the frequency of oscillation of a ship of a given size in waves of given sizes. This was a new problem, added this year, so Gemayel didn't have a written solution. In fact, he'd never looked at the problem before.
他犹豫了五分钟，绕了好几个圈子，最后说：“这里有人做过这道题吗？”坐在我前面的韩国人站起来，写下了答案。
He hemmed and he hawwed for five minutes, going around in some circles, and then he finally said, "Did anyone here do this problem?" The Korean sitting in front of me got up and wrote the solution.
看到教授并非无所不知，这让我感到欣慰，但看到与我处于同一钟形曲线上的韩国人比教授更聪明，也让我感到不安。
It was comforting to see that a professor wasn't omniscient, but it was equally discomforting to see that the Korean, who would be on my bell curve, was smarter than the professor.
Rohsenow 让我们等到课后才把传热测试发回。他做的第一件事就是画出钟形曲线，数字线从 0 到 20。他在讲话前画了 x：7 处有一个 x，9 处有两个，10 处有四个，11 处没有，12 处有两个，13 处有四个，14 处有六个，15 到 20 之间还有八个。
Rohsenow made us wait until after the class to hand back the heat transfer tests. The first thing he did was draw the bell curve, with a number line from 0 to 20. He drew the x's before he spoke: One x at 7, two at 9, four at 10, none at 11, two at 12, four at 13, six at 14, and another eight between 15 and 20.
“数据结果与 Jamie 和我预期的差不多，”Rohsenow 说道。“现在如果你在这里，或者在右边，那就很好了，”他指着数字 14 说道。“如果你在这里的左边，那么也许你应该再做几道题或者考虑放弃。”
"The data came out pretty much the way Jamie and I expected," Rohsenow said. "Now if you're here, or to the right, that's good," he said, pointing to the 14. "If you're to the left of here, well maybe you should do some more problems or think about dropping."
由于已经把辛苦借来的 3,400 美元学费投入其中，因此放弃课程是不可能的。
With 3,400 hard-borrowed dollars invested in tuition, dropping a course is not an option.
那些蓝色的书都放在前面的桌子上。讲座结束后，我们推到桌子前，依次翻找着那堆书，寻找我们自己的书。
The blue books were all sitting on the front table. After the lecture we pushed to the table, rummaging through the pile in turn to find our own.
我希望成绩没有贴在封面上，但结果确实贴了。我的成绩是 14 分，我班上的平均成绩。我记得小学时成绩的口头形式是：“A、优秀、B、良好、C、平均、D、差。”在我聪明的时候，平均似乎总是一件坏事。但在这里我只是松了一口气。平均意味着 B。
I hoped the grades weren't put on the front cover, but they were. Mine was 14-I made class average. I remembered in elementary school the verbal version of grades: "A, excellent, B, good, C, average, D, poor." Average had always seemed a bad thing back when I was smart. But here I just breathed a big sigh of relief. Average meant B.
我在走出教室的路上碰到了玛丽。她站在办公室门口，给正在上 200 课（本科版的 Fluids）的本科生鼓励的话。玛丽有助教职位，这意味着她负责批改作业并帮助学生解答他们可能遇到的任何问题。她和其他优秀的助教一样，教学工作比教授们做得更多。她不会因为学生不理解而责骂他们。而且她的办公室里几乎总是有人，所以她一定很了解自己的工作。
I bumped into Mary on the way out of the class. She was at the door of her office, offering words of encouragement to an undergrad who was taking two twenty, the undergrad version of Fluids. Mary had a teaching assistantship, which meant she graded problem sets and helped the students with any questions they might have. She, like any good TA, did more teaching than the professors. She did not bite her students' heads off for not understanding. And there was almost always someone at her office, so she must have known her stuff.
“你的车通过检查了吗？”我问。
"Did your car pass the inspection?" I asked.
“当然了。对于 1977 年的雪佛兰来说，这还不错。我甚至不需要投入任何资金。我正准备去参加周五晚上的啤酒狂欢。想一起去吗？”
"Sure did. Not bad for a '77 Chevette. I didn't even have to pour any money into it. I'm about to go down to the Friday night beer blast. Care to come along?"
“听起来很有趣。”我们下楼来到米基奇办公室和夏洛特·埃文斯办公室之间的休息室。那里挤满了人：一圈圈白发教授在互相交谈，一圈圈研究生在互相交谈，并与他们的导师和助理教授交谈。偶尔还有本科生。气氛紧张，但很友好。
"That sounds like fun." We went downstairs to the lounge between Mikic's office and Charlotte Evans's office. The area was packed with people: circles of gray-haired professors talking to one another, circles of graduate students talking to one another and to their advisers, the assistant professors. And there was the occasional undergraduate. The atmosphere was wired, but in a friendly way.
“嘿，足球明星，”卡洛斯对我说。
"Hey, soccer star," Carlos said to me.
“我嗎？”
"Moi?"
“是的，你呢。怎么样？”
"Yeah, you. How's it going?"
“很好，谢谢。你呢？”
"Fine, thanks. How about you?"
“很好。你见过吉姆·斯图尔特吗？他在那个技术政策项目里，”吉姆朝我们走来时，卡洛斯说道。
"Good. Say, you met Jim Stuart? He's in that Technology Policy program," Carlos said as Jim walked up to us.
“当然了，”吉姆说。“大家都认识佩珀。”
"Of course he has," Jim said. "Everyone knows Pepper."
米基克教授走到玛丽面前，轻轻拍了拍她的肩膀。“很高兴看到你回来，”他说。
Professor Mikic walked up to Mary and gave her a light pat on the shoulder. "It's good to see you back here," he said.
他看着我说道：“我是玛丽的导师。她是我最引以为豪的学生之一。你的情况怎么样？”
He looked at me and said, "I am Mary's mentor. She has been one of the students I am most proud of. And how are things going with you?"
“无论如何，到目前为止我还活着，”玛丽说。
"I'm surviving, so far anyway," Mary said.
我们寒暄了几句，然后走向茶点桌。玛丽指着一位留着小胡子的金发男子说：“那是彼得·胡伯。他和我一样，都是大一新生。他 23 岁就拿到了博士学位，现在是一名助理教授，在哈佛法学院全职就读。我听说他已经收到了在最高法院担任奥康纳大法官书记员的邀请。”
We exchanged further pleasantries and headed for the refreshment table. Mary pointed out a blond-haired guy with a mustache. "That's Peter Huber. He started here as a freshman the same time I did. He had his Ph.D. by the time he was twenty-three, and he's now an assistant professor and he goes to Harvard Law School full time. I hear he's already gotten an offer to clerk for Justice O'Connor in the Supreme Court."
“好的，但是他的高尔夫球技怎么样？”
"OK, but how's his golf game?"
“他不打高尔夫球。我认为他不打高尔夫球，就是这样。我不知道有谁比他更专注、更有目标。”
"He doesn't play golf. I don't think he plays, period. I don't know anybody more focused and directed than he."
“那边那个和夏皮罗说话的白发男人是谁？”我问道。
"Who's the white-haired guy over there with the beard, talking to Shapiro?" I asked.
“那是‘大君汉克’佩恩特。他是驻地控制天才。有一次，他在港口污水处理厂做紧急咨询时，阻止了波士顿所有下水道堵塞。当时，一条管道破裂或一个阀门卡住了，整个地方都失控了。他拿出自己开发的便携式计算机，在上面模拟了系统，告诉他们打开哪些阀门，关闭哪些阀门，以及关闭速度。”
"That's 'Maharajah Hank' Paynter. He's the resident controls genius. He kept all the sewers in Boston from backing up once when he did some emergency consulting at the treatment plant in the harbor. A pipe had broken or a valve had stuck and the whole place was out of control. He took out a portable computer he'd developed and simulated the system on it and told them what valves to open, what valves to close, and how fast to do it."
我们一直聊到人群渐渐散去，我问她是否有晚餐计划。
We mingled until the crowd started to thin out, and I asked her whether she had plans for dinner.
“不，”她说。“你想去查克河上游吗？”
"No," she said. "How'd you like to go up Chuck River?"
“打扰一下？”
"Excuse me?"
“你知道，去查尔斯河边和哈维一家人聚会。我们可以去潘普洛纳咖啡馆，点一杯浓咖啡，聊聊笛卡尔和萨特。”
"You know, up the Charles to rub elbows with the Harveys. We can go to Cafe Pamplona, order espresso, and talk about Descartes and Sartre."
“当然可以。”我说，然后我们走向她的车。我又问了她一些问题。“我能解释一下过去七年里你从 Dynatech 到麻省理工的经历。你是在哪里长大的？”
"Sure," I said, and we walked to her car. I asked her more questions. "I can account for the past seven years between Dynatech and MIT. Where'd you grow up?"
“我在城市北部的多布斯费里读高中和大部分小学。我的父母对苏联非常感兴趣，所以我在那里读了一二年级。”
"I went to high school and most of elementary school in Dobbs Ferry, north of the City. My parents were really excited about the Soviet Union, so I went to first and second grade there."
“太神奇了，”我说。“你知道吗，当我吃掉我妈妈藏在乒乓球桌下面的好时巧克力棒时，你就在俄罗斯，那张桌子将用作我家的防空洞。当时感觉怎么样？”我问。
"Amazing," I said. "Do you realize that means you were in Russia when I ate the Hershey bars that my mother had hidden under the ping-pong table that was going to be my family's fallout shelter? What was it like?" I asked.
“其实，这没什么大不了的；我的意思是，我没有什么可以与之比较的。不过，这对我的俄语来说很有帮助；我就说这么多。”
"It was no big deal, really; I mean I didn't have much to compare it with. It was great for my Russian, though; I'll tell you that much."
她的蓝色 77 年雪佛兰雪佛兰 Chevette 副驾驶侧的车门从外面打不开，所以她不得不伸手过去让我进去。
The door on the passenger side of her blue '77 Chevette didn't open from the outside, so she had to reach over to let me in.
“他们不再像以前那样生产了，”她说。
"They don't make 'em like they used to," she said.
“是的，那是因为底特律有太多商学院的白痴在管理着一切。这些人即将成为我们的老板，而他们却什么都不知道，这真是令人恼火。”
"Yeah, that's 'cause there's too many B-school bozos running things in Detroit. It's really annoying that those people are going to be our bosses, and they don't know anything."
“是的，我明白你的意思，”她说。“但也许有一天我们会获得一些权力，能够改变现状。”
"Yeah, I know what you mean," she said. "But maybe we'll get some power some day and be able to change things."
我们开车去了哈佛广场，沿着马萨诸塞大道穿过中央广场，经过杰克夜总会和奥森·威尔斯剧院。我们又聊了俄罗斯、华尔街、吉夫托普罗斯和他在萨德伯里的家。玛丽的声音中不时带着讽刺的语气，好像她的聪明才智是个负担——因为她不会被愚弄，所以才成了负担。
We drove to Harvard Square, up Mass. Ave through Central Square, past Jack's Nightclub and the Orson Wells theater. We talked more about Russia, Wall Street, Gyftopoulos, and his home in Sudbury. At times there was a tone of irony in Mary's voice, as if her intelligence were a burden-a burden because she couldn't be fooled.
“啊，有停车位了，”她高兴地说。“而且离广场只有三个街区。”
"Ah, a parking space," she said gleefully. "And only three blocks from the square."
“你知道，我父亲在那里读大学和法学院，”我指着街对面那栋墙边爬满常春藤的古老砖砌建筑说道。“还记得《平步青云》里的那个家伙吗？他是哈佛和哈佛法学院的第四代人。我应该是第三代。”
"You know, my father went there for both college and law school," I said, pointing across the street at the big old brick building with ivy growing up the side. "Remember that guy in The Paper Chase, the one who was fourth-generation Harvard and Harvard Law? I would have been third generation."
“那你为什么不去那儿呢？”当我们左转走到鲍街时她问道。
"So why didn't you go there?" she asked as we walked left onto Bow Street.
“我不想因为基因而去那里。我想去一个更注重成绩的地方。此外，你看看哈佛，它是勤奋的成果。麻省理工学院也是勤奋的。你知道有趣的事情；我想我的父亲也同意我的观点。”
"I didn't want to get in there because of my genes. I wanted to go somewhere that was more merit-oriented. Besides, you look at Harvard, it's the fruit of industry. MIT is industry. And you know the funny thing; I think my father agrees with me."
“嗯，你对麻省理工学院的看法是对的。这里就是咖啡馆。”
"Well, you're right about MIT. Here's the cafe."
那是楼下的一个小房间，比我的卧室大不了多少；我们坐在一张小圆桌旁。房间里有几顶贝雷帽和几件花呢衣服。咖啡馆的音响里正在播放维瓦尔第的《四季》。
It was a little downstairs room hardly bigger than my bedroom; we sat at one of the small round tables. There were several berets and tweed. Vivaldi's Four Seasons was playing on the cafe stereo.
“夏天，”玛丽说。
"Summer," Mary said.
“什么事？”我说道。
"Excuse me?" I said.
“这就是这个季节。你一眼就能看出来，因为它是最乐观的。”
"That's which season this is. You can tell because it's the most upbeat."
“哎呀，我觉得我能认出这是四季酒店之一，”我回答道。
"Gee, and I thought I was doing well to recognize it was one of the Four Seasons," I answered.
我们点了晚餐，继续聊天。“那你再给我讲讲吉夫托普罗斯的秘密吧，”我说，“他为什么这么厉害？”
We ordered our dinner and continued to talk. "So give me some more dirt on Gyftopoulos," I said. "How'd he do so well?"
“他和他的好友哈索普洛斯在 50 年代都是这里的研究生。他们完成博士学位后，需要新的挑战，因此他们开始申请政府资助进行合同研究。他们还为天然气研究所做了很多工作。因此，他们从中获得了合理的现金流，并开始将部分盈余投资于产品开发。一件事又引发了另一件事，现在 Thermo 已经跻身财富 1000 强。”
"Well, he and his buddy Hatsopoulos were both graduate students here back in the '50s. After they finished their Ph.D.s they needed newer challenges, so they started applying for government grants for contract research. They also did a lot of work for the Natural Gas Research Institute. So they developed a reasonable cash flow from that and started investing some of the excess in product development. One thing led to another, and now Thermo's in the Fortune 1000."
“你认为吉夫托普罗斯身价多少百万？”我问道。
"How many millions do you think Gyftopoulos is worth?" I asked.
“我不知道。不过他可能一辈子都安定下来了。”
"I don't know. He's probably set for life, though."
“哎呀。我不知道是什么让他坚持下去的，”我说。
"Gee. I wonder what keeps him going," I said.
“这些人一旦成功，就不是为了钱了，”玛丽说。“接下来的问题就是他们能对世界产生多大的影响。我认为吉夫托普洛斯真的很喜欢教书和在麻省理工学院工作。成为山中之王一定很有趣。”
"These guys aren't in it for the money, once they make it," Mary said. "Then it becomes a matter of how much of an influence they can have in the world. And I think Gyftopoulos genuinely loves teaching and being at MIT. It must be fun to be one of the kings of the mountain."
“是的。他是那种我们都想成为的人，”我说。“不是想转移话题，但是你读本科时在这里的社交生活怎么样？”
"Yeah. He's the kind of guy we all would like to be like," I said. "Not to change the subject, but what was your social life like here when you were an undergrad?"
“嗯，基本上直到春天的第一天暖和起来，这种感觉才出现。然后当我在图书馆学习时，男生们会一个接一个地向我走来，说：‘呃，嗨。呃，你在读什么书？’我的很多朋友也遇到过同样的事情。”
"Well, basically it was nonexistent until the first warm day in the spring. Then when I would study in the library, guys would come up to me one after the other and say, 'Uhh, hi. Uhhh, what are you, uhhh, reading?' The same thing happened to a lot of my friends."
“教授们怎么样？他们怎么样？”
"How about the profs? How were they?"
“有些人还行，有些人就是混蛋。你要记住，这些人中有很多都是麻省理工学院的毕业生——你知道，学士、硕士、博士。他们在高中时从未在社交方面成熟过。他们来到这里，后半生除了工作什么也没做。当他们获得终身教职时，他们终于放松了下来。他们看到像我这样的年轻漂亮女人，不知道该怎么办——如果他们对你有任何权力，比如他们是你的论文导师，那么迟早会有一些愚蠢的性别歧视言论出现。三年前，我剪短了头发，试图让自己看起来不那么有吸引力，避免这些评论，你知道我的一位教授说了什么吗？他说，‘哦，玛丽，你看起来太朋克性感了。’但除此之外，一切都很好。”
"Some were okay, others were jerks. You've got to remember that a lot of these guys are MIT cubed-you know, B.S., M.S., Ph.D. They never matured socially in high school. They came here and did nothing but work for the second half of their lives. They finally relax when they've got tenure. They see a nice young woman like me and they don't know what to do-if they have any power over you, like they're your thesis adviser, some stupid sexist comment is bound to come out sometime. Three years ago I cut my hair short to try to look less attractive and ward off the comments and you know what one of my professors said? He said, 'Oh, Mary, you look so punk sexy.' But other than that it was fine."
我们吃完素餐，去看了《烈火战车》，然后玛丽开车送我回家。
We finished the vegetarian meal, went to see Chariots of Fire, and Mary drove me home.
“我们去 7-Eleven 吧，”我说，“我要买些茶包、牛奶和糖，还有 Hostess 货架上的一些东西。”
"Let's drop by the Seven-Eleven," I said. "I'll get some tea bags, milk, and sugar, and something from the Hostess rack."
我们坐在厨房餐桌旁继续聊天。周五晚上不用一个人过，真好。知道除了斯蒂芬妮，世界上还有其他女人，真好。和玛丽聊天，真好。
We sat at my kitchen table and talked some more. It was good not to spend Friday night by myself. It was good to know that there were other women in the world besides Stephanie. It was good to talk with Mary.
“噢，多可爱的猫啊，”当我室友的猫跳到她的膝盖上并发出呼噜声时，玛丽说道。
"Oh, what a nice cat," Mary said as my roommate's cat jumped up onto her lap and purred.
“是啊，有猫在身边真好，”我撒谎道。“它是我室友的。”
"Yeah, it's nice to have the cat around," I lied. "It belongs to my roommate."
“哦，我想水已经好了，”水壶开始轰隆隆地响起时玛丽说道。
"Oh, I think the water's ready," Mary said as the kettle started to rumble.
当我把杯子拿到桌子上时，一些热水洒在了地板上。
I spilled some hot water on the floor when I brought the cups to the table.
“没问题，”我说。“我用纸巾擦一下就行。”热水在原本灰蒙蒙的地板上留下了白斑。“呃，我本来想打扫一下的，”我说。
"No problem," I said. "I'll just wipe it up with a paper towel." The hot water left a white spot on the otherwise dirt-gray floor. "Uh, I've been meaning to do some cleaning," I said.
“别担心，”她说，不再管我了。
"Don't worry about it," she said, letting me off the hook.
她的美丽与她的脸型无关。我们没有亲吻道晚安，也没有身体接触。她是我的朋友。
She was beautiful in a way that had nothing to do with the layout of her face. We didn't kiss goodnight, didn't touch. She was my friend.
10 月 20 日，星期二
Tuesday, October 20
吉夫托普洛斯自己上课，贝雷塔坐在小教室的前排，帮助吉夫托普洛斯解答以前没有听过的问题。教室最近重新装修，安装了间接照明，一天结束后，感觉就像在家一样。吉夫托普洛斯穿着羊绒衫，在我们开始乞求他提示如何做那周的习题集之前，他尝试了单口喜剧表演。
Gyftopoulos did his own tutorials, with Beretta sitting in the front row of the small classroom to help with any questions that Gyftopoulos hadn't heard before. The room had recently been redone with indirect lighting, and at the end of the day it felt almost homey. Gyftopoulos wore his cashmere sweater and before we started begging for hints for how to do that week's problem set, he tried his hand at stand-up comedy.
“你知道，我们开始讨论化学反应，我们用符号 nu 来表示它。这让我想起了 1954 年我第一次讲课的时候。当时我还年轻，我承认我有点紧张。讲了一个半小时，在黑板上反复写着希腊字母后，一个学生说，‘教授，请问……有什么新情况吗？’”
"You know, we've been starting to talk about chemical reaction, for which we use the symbol nu. Well, that reminds me of the time I was giving my first lecture back in 1954. 1 was young and, I have to admit, I was a little nervous. After talking about an hour and a half and writing the Greek letter over and over again on the board, one of the students said, 'Excuse me professor.... What's new?'"
我恭敬地笑了笑。有几个人发出嘘声。
I laughed dutifully. Several people hissed.
吉夫托普罗斯随后开始回答问题。坐在第二排的穿着军装的家伙迅速举起了手，动作很严肃，像个军人。他问了一个关于今天早上发的作业的问题，作业将在两周后交。
Gyftopoulos then fielded questions. The guy wearing the army uniform who sat in the second row raised his hand quickly, in a rigid military motion. He asked a question about the problem set that had been handed out that morning, due in two weeks.
“我认为我们现在还不需要看这些，”他说，“让我们集中精力处理下周要交的习题集。不过，你的热切让我想起了一个小故事。好像有位中士收到一封电报，说他的一名士兵的母亲去世了。他不知道该如何向那名士兵提起这件事，那名士兵的名字恰好是舒尔茨。于是他让所有士兵排成一排，然后说，‘所有有母亲的人都上前来。’当士兵们走上前时，他说，‘舒尔茨，别那么急。’”
"I don't think we need to look at those yet," he said. "Let's focus on the problem set that's due next week. Your eagerness, though, reminds me of a little story. It seems that there was a sergeant who received a telegram that one of his soldiers' mother had died. He didn't know how to bring it up to the soldier, whose name happened to be Schultz. So he had all his men line up, and he said, 'Everyone who has a mom step forward.' As the men stepped forward, he said, 'Not so fast, Schultz.' "
大家都笑了。
Everyone laughed at that one.
“好了，玩够了。我们回去工作吧，”他说。“还有其他问题吗？”
"Well, enough of the fun and games. Let's get back to work," he said. "Are there any other questions?"
“亲费瑟？”那个戴着金丝边眼镜、留着浓密小胡子的家伙说道。
"Pro-Fesser?" the guy with wire-rimmed glasses and a bushy mustache said.
“是的，刘易斯。”
"Yes, Lewis."
“你能再讲一下上一组问题中关于热电联产的问题吗？”
"Could you go over the problem on cogeneration on the last problem set?"
“当然。你有问题陈述的副本吗？”
"Certainly. Do you have a copy of the problem statement?"
刘易斯从活页夹中取出了这封信。吉夫托普洛斯放下香烟，走到黑板前。坐在我旁边的化学工程师低声说：“我不知道你怎么想，但他抽烟让我很紧张。我宁愿核工程师更避险一点。”
Lewis unclipped it from his binder. Gyftopoulos put his cigarette down and went to the blackboard. The chemical engineer sitting next to me whispered, "I don't know about you, but it makes me nervous that he smokes. I'd rather that a nuclear engineer was a little more risk-averse."
“至少它们是过滤嘴香烟。”我低声回答道。
"At least they're filter cigarettes," I whispered back.
吉夫托普洛斯开始解释。“如你所知，热电联产是指用一台发动机（通常是柴油发动机或燃气轮机）同时产生电力和有用的热量。我们想要做的是尽量减少燃料的总体使用量以保护环境。我们意识到必须有烟囱和燃烧产物，或者有些人会说，‘污染产物’，但如果我们设计出满足工业过程或家庭供暖对电力和热量需求的系统，我们就可以尽量减少污染产物。顺便说一句，让我向你强调一点。如果你在未来的职业生涯中涉足能源行业，你会发现有大量的钱可以赚。但你永远不要忘记，作为一名工程师，你不能只考虑钱，而应该考虑如何造福社会。”
Gyftopoulos started his explanation. "As you know, cogeneration is the simultaneous generation of electricity and useful heat with one engine, typically a diesel engine or a gas turbine. What we want to do is to minimize the overall use of fuel to protect the environment. We realize that there have to be smokestacks with products of combustion, or as some would say, 'products of pollution,' but if we design systems with a match between needs for electricity and heat either for industrial processes or for heating of homes, we can minimize the products of pollution. And by the way, let me emphasize one point to you. If in your future careers you become involved in the energy industry, you will see that there is a tremendous amount of money to be made. But you must never forget that as an engineer you must not think of the money, but rather how you can benefit society."
吉夫托普洛斯继续解释这个问题。接下来的一个小时里，其他问题继续被问。学生们偶尔会说俏皮话，吉夫托普洛斯总是会反驳。气氛很友好、没有威胁、很人性化。
Gyftopoulos continued the explanation of the problem. Other questions continued for the rest of the hour. There were occasional wisecracks from the students, never left without a rebuttal from Gyftopoulos. The atmosphere was collegial, nonthreatening, human.
那天晚上，玛丽、马特、卡洛斯和我在卡洛斯的办公室讨论一些流体问题。马特建议了解决方法。对于给定的问题，我们中的一个人会在黑板上画出问题陈述并开始解答。如果做题的人遇到困难，我们其他人会帮助他。“让我们从一些伯努利方程问题开始，”马特说。“你想试一试吗，玛丽？”
That night Mary, Matt, Carlos, and I met in Carlos's office to go over some fluids problems. Matt suggested the way to proceed. For a given problem, one of us would draw the problem statement on the blackboard and start the solution. The rest of us would help whoever was doing the problem if he or she came to a dead end. "Let's start with some of these problems with the Bernoulli equation," Matt said. "Do you want to give one a shot, Mary?"
“当然了，”她说，“这是我昨晚做的一道题，D-28。它是化油器。不过首先大家都应该理解伯努利方程，对吧？”
"Sure," she said. "Here's one that I worked on last nightproblem D-28. It's a carburetor. But first everyone understands the Bernoulli equation, right?"
马特和卡洛斯点了点头，我摇了摇头。“我理解夏皮罗在课堂上所做的推导，了解伯努利方程如何从纳维叶-斯托克斯方程中得出，但我并不完全理解它的物理原理。”
Matt and Carlos nodded and I shook my head. "I understand the derivation Shapiro did in class, how the Bernoulli equation falls out of the Navier-Stokes equations, but I don't fully understand it physically."
“是的，这有点棘手，”她说。“想象一下伯努利坐在佛罗伦萨老桥上他表弟的珠宝店里。他俯视着阿诺河，试图弄清楚在梅迪奇基金会的下一个研究提案中要写些什么。他看着河中间的两块石头，他注意到水在它们之间加速流动。他有一个可资助研究的开创性想法。‘如果我沿着溪流穿过岩石的路径画一条线，然后想象一小管流体沿着那条线流动，那小管的能量必须沿着那条线保持不变。’明白了吗？”
"Yeah, it is kind of a toughie," she said. "Just imagine Bernoulli sitting in his cousin's jewelry shop on the Ponte Vecchio in Florence. He's looking down at the Arno trying to figure out what to put in his next research proposal for the Medici Foundation. He's looking at two rocks in the middle of the river, and he notices that the water speeds up between them. He has a seminal idea for fundable research. 'If I draw a line following the path of the stream through the rocks, and then imagine a little tube of fluid going along that line, the energy of that little tube has to be constant along that line.' Got it?"
我点点头。“我明白了，但我仍然不明白它的物理意义。我的意思是，你会认为如果流体加速，它就会有更多的能量，就像汽车跑得越快，动能就越多，”我说。
I nodded up and down. "I understand that much, but I still don't have the physical meaning down. I mean, you'd think if the fluid sped up it would have more energy, just like a car has more kinetic energy the faster it goes," I said.
玛丽继续说道：“但动能必须来自某个地方。它来自储存在流体静压中的能量。可以这样想：小管是一个被压缩的小弹簧，有一大堆这样的小压缩弹簧彼此平行移动。它们要穿过岩石的唯一方法就是稍微松开一点。对于这个小弹簧来说，松开意味着弹簧的前部远离弹簧的后部。所有其他弹簧都做同样的事情，水可以毫无问题地穿过岩石。当压缩弹簧膨胀时，它储存的能量会减少。压力能的减少量等于动能或速度能的增加量。”
Mary continued, "But the kinetic energy has to come from somewhere. And it comes from the energy stored in the static pressure of the fluid. Think of it like this: the little tube is a little spring that's compressed, and there's a whole bunch of these little compressed springs moving along parallel to each other. The only way they're all going to make it through the rocks is to loosen up a little bit. For this little spring, loosening up means that the front of the spring moves away from the back of the spring. All the other springs do the same thing and the water goes through the rocks, senza problema. When a compressed spring expands, it has less energy stored in it. The amount of decrease in pressure energy is equal to the increase in kinetic or speed energy."
“好的。我同意，”我回答道。“但是夏皮罗今天说，它只适用于不可压缩流体。如果流体不可压缩，压力怎么会上升和下降呢？”
"OK. I'll buy that," I answered. "But Shapiro said today that it only applied to incompressible flows. If the flow is incompressible, how can the pressure go up and down?"
卡洛斯插话说：“不可压缩只是意味着施加压力时体积不会改变。这就像如果你在水面上放一个重物，体积不会改变，但压力会增加。想想看，这就像在这里当学生一样。他们给我们施加了很多压力，但我们的体积没有变化。”
Carlos jumped in on that one. "Incompressible just means that the volume doesn't change when you apply the pressure. It's like if you put a weight on some water, the volume doesn't change but the pressure goes up. Come to think of it, it's like being a student here. They put lots of pressure on us but our volume doesn't change."
如果我们能帮助的话就不会。
Not if we can help it.
玛丽又重新思考这个问题。“这是化油器的问题，”她重申道。
Mary went back to the problem. "It's a carburetor," she reiterated.
“他们想知道需要多少空气通过这么小的管道才能从管道外部的孔中吸入规定量的液体。现在，水不再通过阿诺河中的几块岩石，而是通过空气。当其静压低于大气压时，它会吸入处于大气压下的燃料。空气进入管道的速度越快，压力就越低，吸入的燃料就越多。”
"They want to know how much air has to go through how small a tube to bring in a specified amount of fluid from the holes around the outside of the tube. Now instead of water going through a couple of rocks in the Arno, we have air going through the tube. When its static pressure goes down below atmospheric, it sucks in fuel that's at atmospheric pressure. The faster the air goes in the tube, the lower the pressure will be, and the more fuel it will pull in."
她继续建立方程式，并根据问题的几何形状推导出燃料流量。我以前看过流体力学，但这里的问题不同。以前的概念是抽象的，而这里的概念是切实的。夏皮罗课上的许多几何形状和问题都是真实的设备。我记得罗森诺告诉我，物理学家推导出一个现象的方程式，然后说“万岁”，而工程师则从物理学家推导出的方程式开始，然后尝试构建一些可以工作的东西。
She went on to set up the equations and derive the fuel flow rate as related to the geometry of the problem. I had seen fluid mechanics before, but the problems here were different. Before the concepts were abstract-here they were tangible. Many of the geometries and the problems in Shapiro's class were real devices. I remembered Rohsenow's telling me that a physicist derives equations for a phenomenon and says "Hooray," and an engineer starts with the equations the physicist derives and then tries to build something that works.
“好了，”玛丽一边说，一边在黑板底部画出答案。“下一个？”
"There," Mary said as she circled the answer on the bottom of the chalkboard. "Next?"
“谁能解释一下为什么茶叶最后会浮到杯子中央？”我问道。“自从我看到花生漫画里薄荷·佩蒂问这个问题后，我就一直想知道答案。”
"Can someone explain why the tea leaves end up in the center of the cup?" I asked. "Ever since I saw the Peanuts cartoon where Peppermint Patty asks that, I've wanted to know the answer."
“我可以帮忙，”马特说。“这是夏皮罗制作的一部影片中的片段；我在本科生学流体学的时候看过。这就是所谓的二次流动。当你搅拌茶时，液体会像旋转木马上的马一样转圈。神秘之处在于，你可能会认为茶叶会因为离心力而流到茶杯外面，就像你在快速旋转木马上一样。但事实并非如此——它们最终会流到茶杯中央。让我把它画在黑板上。”
"I can help out on that one," Matt said. "It was in one of those films Shapiro produced; I saw it when I took undergrad fluids. It's what they call a secondary flow. When you stir the tea, the liquid goes around in circles, like horses on a merry-go-round. The mystery is that you might expect the tea leaves to go to the outside of the teacup because of centrifugal force, just like when you're on a fast merry-go-round. But they don't-they end up in the center. Let me draw it on the board."
他画了一个垂直圆柱，上面有一个圆形箭头，表示旋转。我想知道我是否会像马特和玛丽一样聪明。让拥有麻省理工学院本科教育的人和背景较差的人一起上课，这似乎有点不公平。
He drew a vertical cylinder with a circular arrow above it to indicate rotation. I wondered whether I'd ever be as smart as Matt and Mary. It seemed almost unfair to let people with MIT undergrad educations loose in classes with people with lesser backgrounds.
“如果你想象在圆柱体中任何高度有一小块流体，有点像旋转木马上的一匹长方形马，它将受到来自靠近中心一侧的压力和来自靠近旋转木马外侧一侧的压力。外部的压力必须大于内部的压力，以平衡流体块的离心力。在圆柱体的底部，距离中心一定距离处的压力与圆柱体顶部的压力相同。但是，由于杯底的摩擦力，茶和茶叶在底部的速度也会变慢。你知道，就像你在旋转木马上一样，你走得越慢，离心力就越小。所以，如果你的外部压力仍然大于内部压力，而离心力较小，你，即茶叶块，就会移动到杯子的中心。事实上，一些茶总是在中心循环穿过杯子的顶部，沿着侧面向下，然后沿着底部回到中心。”
"If you imagine a little chunk of fluid at any height in the cylinder, sort of like a rectangular horse on the merry-go-round, it'll have pressure pushing on it from the side closer to the center and pressure pushing on it from the side closer to the outside of the merry-go-round. The pressure on the outside has to be greater than the pressure on the inside, to balance the centrifugal force of the chunk of fluid. On the bottom of the cylinder, the pressure at a given distance from the center is the same as it is at the top of the cylinder. But the tea and the tea leaves, too, go slower at the bottom because of the friction caused by the bottom of the cup. You know that, just like when you're on the merry-go-round, the slower you go, the less centrifugal force you have. So if you still have more pressure on the outside than on the inside, and less centrifugal force, you, the chunk of tea plus leaves, are going to move to the center of the cup. In fact, some of the tea is always circulating, up the center of the cup, across the top, down the side, and back to the center along the bottom."
我说：“谢谢。我想我明白了。还有其他人有问题想问吗？”
I said, "Thanks. I think I've got it. Anybody else have any questions they want to go over?"
卡洛斯说：“B 部分中有一个消防水带问题。‘如果一条消防水带每分钟向火场水平喷射 800 加仑的水，而一名消防员可以提供 125 磅的水平力，那么需要多少名消防员才能防止消防水带像野蛇一样乱挥？”
Carlos said, "There's this fire hose problem from section B. 'If a fire hose is delivering 800 gallons per minute to a fire, horizontally, and a fireman can provide a horizontal force of 125 pounds, how many firemen will it take to prevent the fire hose from flailing around like a wild snake?"
“我认为你能解决这个问题，”我说，“这是动量定理问题。你只需要算出从消防水管中流出的动量是多少，速度有多快。这等于力。”
"I think you can solve that one," I said. "It's a momentum theorem problem. You just have to figure out how much momentum is going out of the fire hose and how fast. That equals the force."
我在黑板上写着。首先，我根据喷嘴的大小计算出水从软管中流出的速度。每秒 100 英尺，或大约每小时 70 英里。这是最简单的部分，任何八年级学生都可以做到。在日本。接下来，我计算出每秒有多少磅的水从软管中流出（大约 100 磅）。
I wrote on the board. First I calculated how fast the water was leaving the hose, on the basis of the size of the nozzle. 100 feet per second, or about 70 miles an hour. That was the easy part, the part that any eighth grader can do. In Japan. Below that I calculated how many pounds of water were leaving the hose each second (about 100 pounds).
然后我将这两个数字转换为公制，并将它们相乘。这样我就得到了力，单位是牛顿，以艾萨克爵士命名。然后我将其转换回磅，得到了答案——2.8 名消防员。
Then I converted both numbers to the metric system and multiplied them together. This gave me the force, in newtons, named for Sir Isaac. Then I converted it back to pounds and had the answer-2.8 firemen.
同事们对我的解决方案大加赞赏，玛丽补充道：“这让我想起了我来这里第一周时大一导师说的话。‘在麻省理工学院接受教育就像从消防水管里喝水一样。’”
My colleagues applauded my solution, and Mary added, "That reminds me of what my freshman adviser said during my first week here. 'Getting an education at MIT is like getting a drink of water from a fire hose.' "
章节
C H A P T E R
5
5
资金
Funding
11 月 2 日
November 2
星期一下午三点，我去和汤姆·布莱交谈。汤姆·布莱是机械工程系的常驻节能、太阳能和替代能源专家。他原是南非英国人，在明尼苏达大学担任助理教授。在那里，他因地下建筑（地下建筑由于隔热值高且地面温度稳定，需要更少的燃料来加热和冷却）而闻名。他还开发了一种系统，可以在冬天制冰，然后在夏天融化冰用于空调。
Monday at three o'clock I went in to talk to Tom Bligh. Tom Bligh was the Mechanical Engineering department's resident energy conservation, solar, and alternative energy guru. Originally a British South African, he'd paid his dues as assistant professor at the University of Minnesota. There he'd made a name for himself in underground buildings (buildings so designed need less fuel to heat and cool because of the insulating value and stable temperature of the ground). He'd also developed a system to make ice in the winter and then melt it in the summer for air-conditioning.
麻省理工学院聘请他担任副教授；他正在与能源部合作进行几个项目，这些项目是卡特时代政府资助的。
MIT recruited him as an associate professor; he had several ongoing projects with the Department of Energy-grants from the Carter era, when the government funded those kinds of things.
布莱的办公室在 3 号楼四楼，与伍迪·弗劳尔斯的办公室隔着一条走廊，伍迪·弗劳尔斯教授一门名为“万物如何运作”的课程。走廊稍远处是机器人专家沃伦·西林，他每月将自己的咨询费提高 10 美元/小时，以减缓业务增长。
Bligh's office was on the fourth floor of Building 3, down the hall from that of Woodie Flowers, who taught a course called "How Things Work." A little farther down the hall was Warren Seering, the robotics whiz who raised his consulting fees by $10 an hour every month in an effort to slow business.
四楼是该部门的设计部门。他们是发明家，是真正的创意者。虽然研究所里的许多人一只脚踏在科学上，另一只脚踏在工程上，两只手都在政府的口袋里，但四楼会以每小时数千美元的价格租给产品开发人员，只是为了互相交流想法。
The fourth floor housed the design section of the department. These were the inventors, the truly creative. While many at the institute had one foot in science, the other in engineering, and two hands in the government's pockets, the fourth floor would rent itself out to product developers for thousands of dollars an hour just to shout ideas back and forth to one another.
布莱办公室旁边的展示柜里放着布莱前一年学生的作品——一个带有自动翻页器的乐谱架。布莱办公室外面的等候室里有一张海报，上面写着：“如果你爱某样东西，就放手吧。如果它回到你身边，它就是你的。如果它没有回到你身边，它就永远不是你的。”这是我第一次看到这张海报，所以它对我来说意义重大；它让我想起了斯蒂芬妮。
In the display case next to Bligh's office was a student project from the year before-a music stand with an automatic page turner. In the waiting room outside Bligh's office was a poster that read, "If you love something let it go. If it comes back to you it's yours. If it doesn't it never was." It was the first time I'd seen that poster, so it meant something to me; it reminded me of Stephanie.
“您好，教授，”我说，“我想申请 15,000 美元的林德伯格奖学金，我想知道您是否有兴趣成为我的教职赞助人。大致领域是替代能源，我有一个项目想法。”
"Hello, Professor," I said. "I'd like to apply for a Lindbergh Fellowship for $15,000 and I'd like to know whether you'd be interested in being my faculty sponsor. The general area is alternative energy, and I've got an idea for a project."
“请叫我汤姆，”他说。他的办公室有天窗。到处都是文件和模型。他有着棕色的头发、胡须和眼镜，大约四十岁。
"Please, call me Tom," he said. His office had a skylight. Papers and models were everywhere. He had brown hair, a beard, and glasses and was about forty.
他继续说道：“好吧，如果你能接受申请一笔纪念法西斯分子的赠款，我很乐意帮助你。”
He continued, "Well, if you can stomach applying for a grant in memory of a fascist, I'd be happy to help you."
“为什么他是个法西斯分子？”我问道。
"Why was he a fascist?" I asked.
“他在二战期间非常支持德国，强烈反对美国参与。关于这一点的书已经有很多了，”他说。
"He was very pro-German in World War II, very much against U.S. involvement. Plenty of books have been written about it," he said.
“我只知道他是一名技术专家和飞行员。当我申请这笔补助金时，我只需要考虑这些。我需要钱。”
"All I know is he was a technologist and aviator. That's all I need to think about when I apply for this grant. I need the money."
“好吧，那么你有什么主意吗？”布莱问道。
"All right, then, what's your idea?" Bligh asked.
“嗯，这是我去年从比利时的一个朋友那里得到的主意。你知道堪萨斯州和内布拉斯加州冬天有多冷多风吗？为什么不直接用风车驱动热泵来给房子或谷仓供暖呢？风越大，风车提供的驱动热泵的功率就越大，因此风的冷却效果就会被泵送的热量增加所抵消，”我说。
"Well, it's an idea I got from a friend of mine in Belgium last year. You know how it gets really cold and windy in Kansas and Nebraska in the winter? Why not have a windmill that drives a heat pump directly to heat the house or the barn? The windier it gets, the more power will be available from the windmill to drive the heat pump, so the cooling effect of the wind will be negated by the increased heat that's pumped," I said.
“等一下，我打电话给我的专利律师，”他开玩笑说，然后又恢复了严肃。“你能给我解释一下热泵的工作原理吗？”
"Hold on a minute while I call my patent attorney," he joked, then went back to being serious. "Can you explain to me how a heat pump works?"
这是一次友好的盘问，所以我诚实地回答道：“不是的。我只知道这有点像反向空调。我拿到补助金后就能弄清楚。”
It was a friendly cross-examination, so I answered honestly. "Not really. All I know is that it's sort of like an air conditioner in reverse. I could figure that out after I get the grant."
“这就是精神所在，”他讽刺地说道，但同时也是一位成功时间管理者的智慧。“我们现在就制定一个大纲，然后你可以在一周左右的时间里带着一个完整的版本回来。你打算调查什么？”他问道。
"That's the spirit," he said with irony, but also the wisdom of a successful time manager. "Let's put an outline together now, then you can come back in a week or so with a fleshed-out version. What do you propose to investigate?" he asked.
“首先，我会把风车当作现成的物品。也许你甚至可以使用他们用来抽水的风车，并将转换套件连接到不同的齿轮机构上。然后，我会查看风车的功率曲线和热泵在不同温度下的性能曲线，然后我会推荐不同的尺寸匹配策略。最后，我会进行一些经济分析，找出与传统燃油加热系统相比的回报。”
"First, I'd take the windmill as an off-the-shelf item. Maybe you could even use one they use to pump water and attach a conversion kit to a different gear mechanism. Then I'd look at the power curves for the windmill and the performance curves for the heat pump at different temperatures, and then I'd recommend different size-matching strategies. Finally, I'd put together some economic analysis, figure out the payback over a conventional oilfired heating system."
“这是你的四个部分。一周后见。”
"There are your four sections. See you in a week."
11 月 5 日
November 5
夏洛特·埃文斯的资料包中列出了乔·史密斯，他是低温学（研究极寒天气）和热电联产（吉夫托普洛斯问题集中的小型发电厂）方面的专家。我对极寒天气没什么兴趣，但热电联产似乎是防止极地冰盖融化的好办法。
Charlotte Evans's packet listed Joe Smith as a specialist in cryogenics, the study of the very cold, and cogeneration, the small power plants in Gyftopoulos's problem sets. I didn't have much interest in the very cold, but cogeneration seemed to be a great way to keep the polar ice caps from melting.
终身教授乔·史密斯的办公室位于高压磁铁实验室的一侧。作为一名机械工程师，他负责保持电气工程师的磁铁温度足够低，以便进行超导性测试。他的窗户俯瞰着麻省理工学院的蒸汽热发电厂。
Joe Smith, tenured professor, had his office off to one side, near the high-voltage magnet laboratory. He, a mechanical engineer, kept the electrical engineers' magnet cold enough to do tests in superconductivity. His window overlooked MIT's steam heat generating plant.
“儿子，我能为你做些什么？”他操着南方口音，像父亲一样问道。
"What can I do for you, son?" he asked in a fatherly manner, with a southern accent.
“嗯，我对节能、热电联产、热回收、隔热、太阳能等任何能节约能源的东西都感兴趣。我看到你在做热电联产方面的工作，”我说。
"Well, I'm interested in energy conservation, cogeneration, heat recovery, insulation, solar energy-anything that saves energy. I saw that you do work in cogeneration," I said.
“是的，但目前我没有任何资金投入，”他靠在椅子上，双脚搁在桌子上，双手交叉放在脑后说道。“不过，如果你能自己筹集到一些资金，我很乐意担任你的顾问。”他让我想起了南方的一位种植园主。
"Yes I do, but right now I don't have any money in it," he said, leaning back in his chair, his feet up on the desk and hands clasped behind his head. "If you can come up with some funding in that area on your own, though, I'd be happy to be your adviser." He reminded me of a southern plantation owner.
“儿子，我给你一点建议，”他补充道。“当你研究能源时，就假装自己在经营采矿业务。集中精力寻找和开采集中区域，以期获得最大的收益。不要担心从矿渣堆中回收任何东西。你花费的时间和精力会比你得到的更多。”
"Just a little piece of advice, son," he added. "When you work on energy, pretend you're running a mining operation. Focus your efforts on finding and extracting the most out of the concentrated areas of what you're mining. Don't worry about recovering anything from the slag heap. You'll spend more time and energy than you'll ever get out of it."
我记得高中时看过一个电视节目。寺院里的大师也说了这样的谜语。等我明白他的意思后，我就可以离开了。
I remembered watching a TV show in high school. The master at the monastery talked in riddles like that, too. When I understand what he means, I can leave.
11 月 16 日
November 16
这本黄色的亮面宣传册热情洋溢地描述了这位租车大亨的爱国主义情怀——他的勤奋工作和决心，加上市场的自由，使他积累了巨额财富。现在，他想通过为有才华的理工科学生提供免费乘车服务来回报国家。
The yellow glossy brochure spoke glowingly about the patriotism of the rental car magnate-how his hard work and determination, plus the freedom of the marketplace, had enabled him to build a fortune. Now he wanted to repay the country by providing free rides to talented science and engineering students.
宣传册指出，“强大的技术队伍对于强大的国防、保持对对手的技术优势至关重要。我们诚邀信守这些原则的个人申请奖学金。奖学金包括学费、书籍和用品津贴以及每月 800 美元的免税津贴。”
The brochure noted, "A strong technical workforce is essential for a strong defense, to maintain technological superiority over our adversaries. Individuals committed to these principles are invited to apply for the fellowship. The fellowship includes tuition, an allowance for books and supplies, and a stipend of $800 per month, free of taxes."
我的申请已经审核完毕，面试定于上午十点在德雷珀举行。德雷珀实验室的标志由一系列圆圈和“D”中的靶心组成。由于他们的主要产品是瞄准器，所以靶心很有意义。大厅里摆放着德雷珀开发的惯性制导系统的模型。这些陀螺仪使飞机可以在自动驾驶下飞行。它们让人类登上月球。它们使洲际弹道导弹能够飞行数千英里，并在距离目标数百英尺的范围内着陆。
My application had been reviewed and my interview was scheduled for ten in the morning at Draper. Draper Laboratories' logo had a series of circles and a bull's-eye point inside the D. Since their main product involved aiming things, the bull's eye made sense. The lobby had models of the inertial guidance systems developed at Draper. These gyroscopes allow airplanes to operate under automatic pilot. They let men walk on the moon. And they enable intercontinental ballistic missiles to fly thousands of miles and land within hundreds of feet of target.
这位黑头发、人造丝衬衫、涤纶领带、双面针织夹克、肩部挂着大皮套的警卫给杰克逊博士打了电话。杰克逊博士来了，给我签了名；然后我们一起乘电梯到了四楼。这座新建筑建于 1976 年，外观光滑，白色，玻璃连续环绕着八层楼。我把访客徽章夹在棕色粗花呢夹克上，徽章向前突出了一点。会议室有一扇窗户，可以看到百老汇和汉普郡街对面的萨默维尔。走廊上的大部分门都关着，用穿孔密码锁锁着。
The guard-greased black hair, rayon shirt, polyester tie, and double-knit jacket covering a bulging shoulder holster-telephoned Dr. Jackson. Dr. Jackson arrived and signed me in; then we both took the elevator to the fourth floor. The new building, built in 1976, was sleek and white with glass that wrapped continuously around each of the eight floors. The visitor's badge I clipped to my brown tweed jacket stuck forward a little. The conference room had a window, with a view across Broadway and up Hampshire Street into Somerville. Most of the doors on the hallway were closed, with punch code locks.
面试中唯一的问题与能源有关。两位工程学博士想让我告诉他们如何从河流中获取能源。不是像我在瑞士看到的那样，从瀑布、水坝或水库（水库有一条管道通向山下 3,000 英尺处的涡轮机）获取能源，而是从缓缓流淌的河流中获取能源。
The only question of the interview concerned energy. The two engineering doctors wanted me to tell them how I would extract power from the flow of a river. Not at a waterfall, or a dam, or a reservoir with a pipe going to a turbine 3,000 feet down the moun tain like I'd seen in Switzerland, but from a river gently meandering along.
“好吧，”我回答道，“我想你可以在河中间放一根管子，然后在管子的下游端放一个涡轮机。”
"Well," I answered, "I suppose you could put a pipe in the middle of the river and put a turbine at the downstream end of the pipe."
“您如何计算功率输出？管道和水面之间的角度会有什么影响吗？”
"How would you calculate the power output? Would the angle between the pipe and the water surface make a difference?"
好问题。我想问问我是否可以离开，几个小时后再回复他们。但我却口齿不清地回答了好几分钟，直到其中一个人说：“我想我们已经听够了。感谢您接受我们的采访。”
Good questions. I wanted to ask whether I could leave and get back to them in a couple of hours. Instead I verbally fumbled for several minutes, until one of them said, "I think we've heard enough. Thank you for interviewing with us."
外面有一群示威者，还有一位身材矮小、胡子稀疏、头发花白的男子，手里拿着一根棍子，棍子上有一个地球仪。它看上去就像一个巨大的蓝绿色 Tootsie Pop。
Outside was a group of several demonstrators, and a short, thin-bearded, white-haired man holding a stick with a globe on it. It looked like a giant blue and green Tootsie Pop.
其他人则在白纸上用横幅毡布写下了自制的字母：“解除武装需要智慧、爱心和仁慈。”
The others' homemade banner-felt letters on a white sheetsaid, "To disarm requires wisdom, love, and mercy."
我想，剑桥自由主义者。这些人为什么不做些对经济有益的事情呢？
Cambridge liberals, I thought. Why don't these people do something productive for the economy?
其中一人递给我一张绿色的纸。我环顾四周，看看有没有摄像机对着我，然后接受了。
One of them offered me a green sheet of paper. I looked around to see whether there were any video cameras pointing in my direction, then accepted.
传单上写道：“自 1979 年以来，每个星期一，德雷珀都会举行非暴力守夜活动。尽管我们充分意识到自己在实践非暴力之爱方面所犯下的个人错误，但我们仍继续选择见证非暴力之爱是通往和平之路的真理。我们发誓要通过我们的默默见证、我们的传单、抗税、为穷人服务、直接行动和服刑来表达这一真理。”
The leaflet read, "Every Monday since 1979, a nonviolent vigil has taken place at Draper. Fully conscious of our personal failures in the practice of nonviolent love, we continue to choose to witness to the truth of the way of nonviolent love as the way to peace. We vow to express this truth in our silent witness, our leaflets, tax resistance, service to the poor, direct actions, and in serving time in jail."
我不知道他们所谓的直接行动是什么意思。我不知道这些人是否认为自己是真正的美国人，他们对防御的必要性有什么认识。也许他们是苏联资助的小人物，试图破坏德雷珀工程师和科学家的承诺。或者，也许，他们说得对。我记得我的祖先离开了一个安全、防守严密的岛屿（英格兰），航行到世界的边缘，与印第安人交朋友。
I wondered what they meant by direct action. I wondered whether these people considered themselves real Americans, what sense they had of the need for defense. Maybe they were little Soviet-funded gnats trying to undermine the commitment of Draper's engineers and scientists. Or maybe, just maybe, they were right. I remembered that my ancestors had left a secure, well-defended island (England) to sail off the edge of the world and make friends with the Indians.
我在学生中心的咖啡店遇见了吉姆·斯图尔特，并告诉他面试的事情。“你可能得不到，”他说。“我听说只有成绩全优的本科生才能获得这个机会。此外，我不确定你是否愿意。他们说没有附加条件，但他们确实会把你推向国防工作。他们鼓励你在国防实验室找到高薪的暑期工作，然后你就只知道这些了。我实验室的一个朋友就曾有过这样的经历，直到为时已晚才知道发生了什么。我想他最后进了精神病院。”
I met Jim Stuart at the student center coffee shop and told him about the interview. "You probably won't get it," he said. "I heard those only go to straight-A undergraduates. Besides, I'm not sure you'd want it. They say there're no strings attached, but they really push you into defense work. They encourage you to have high-paying summer jobs at defense labs, and then that's the only thing you know. A friend of a guy from my lab had one of those and didn't know what was happening until it was too late. I think he ended up in a mental hospital."
11 月 17 日，星期二
Tuesday, November 17
弗雷德里克·威尔在系里简报上刊登了广告：“招聘研究助理。高压应用在地质结构断裂中。赞助商：美孚。”翻译过来就是：威尔以碾碎岩石为生。
Frederick Weare had advertised in the department newsletter: "Research Assistantship available. High-pressure application to fracture in geological structures. Sponsor: Mobil." Translation: Weare crushed rocks for a living.
有传言称，威尔每天骑自行车往返于 15 英里外尼德姆的公寓。还有传言称，他的妻子最近与他离婚了，因为她再也没有见过他。
Weare, rumor had it, rode his bicycle to and from his apartment fifteen miles away in Needham every day. Rumor also had it that his wife had recently divorced him because she never saw him anymore.
我当天下班后要去 3 号楼地下室的威尔实验室。实验室有几张黑色桌面，上面放着含油岩石样本、电子电路零件和几台示波器，还有装在精美盒子里的微型绿色电视屏幕，前面有很多旋钮。
My appointment was at the end of the day in Weare's lab in the basement of Building 3. The lab had several black tabletops with samples of oil-laden rock on them, and bits and pieces of electronic circuitry and several oscilloscopes, miniature green TV screens in fancy boxes with lots of knobs on front.
威尔很年轻，身材苗条，留着金色头发和小胡子。他的眼睛看起来有点疲惫。他说话带有轻微的口音，好像他曾在国外待过很长时间，但我听不出来。也许他来自爱尔兰。
Weare was young and quite slim, with blond hair and a mustache. His eyes looked a little tired. He spoke with a slight accent, as if he'd been overseas somewhere for an extended period, but I couldn't place it. Maybe he was originally from Ireland.
“你的专长是什么？”他在面试刚开始时问我。
"What's your expertise?" he asked me early in the interview.
我不知道我应该已经拥有专业知识；我以为我来麻省理工学院就是为了获得它。
I didn't know I was supposed to have expertise already; I thought I had come to MIT to get it.
“呃，我做了很多与流体相关的工作；在布鲁塞尔的冯·卡门研究所，我做了一些仪器仪表、温度测量方面的工作，以及太阳能储热实验，”我回答道。
"Uh, well, I've done a lot of work with fluids; at the von Karman Institute in Brussels I did some work with instrumentation, temperature measurements, in a solar heat storage experiment," I answered.
韦雷笑了笑。“啊，是的，太阳能真是好东西。你是环保主义者吗？”
Weare smirked. "Ah yes, good old solar energy. Are you an environmentalist?"
我不知道该怎么回答。“嗯，差不多吧。”我说。
I didn't know the right answer. "Well, sort of," I said.
“我也是，”他说。“但全职教授职位是我一生的个人目标之一，我必须进行可资助的研究才能实现这一目标。然后我可能会再次涉足那些软性的东西。”
"So am I," he said. "But full professorship is on my list of lifetime personal goalc, and I have to do fundable research to achieve that. Then maybe I'll dabble in that soft stuff again."
“我的论文项目会对环境产生什么影响？”我问道。
"What would be the environmental impact of my thesis project?" I asked.
“实际上，它比其他许多正在开发的技术危害更小。我建议进行多次地下爆炸，对石油产生巨大压力，从而将其从山上抽出，而不是必须挖开岩石并将其开采到山外，”他说。
"It actually would be less harmful than many of the other technologies under development. What I'm proposing is to make many underground explosions that will create big pressures on the oil and allow it to be pulled up out of the mountain rather than having to remove the rock and extract it outside the mountain," he said.
“嗯，听起来很有意思。你愿意雇用我吗？”我问道。
"Well, it sounds interesting. Do you think you'd like to hire me?" I asked.
他停顿了一下。“我会看一下你的简历，然后再回复你。我还有几个人要面试。如果你在一周内没有收到我的回复，就给我的秘书打电话。”
He paused. "I'll look over your resume and then get back to you. I've got a couple more people to interview. If you don't hear from me within a week, give my secretary a call."
也许还会发生其他事情。
Maybe something else will come up.
那天晚上，我站在传热解决方案板前，抄下了最新一组问题的答案。他们没有直接分发这些解决方案，这仍然让我很恼火。但是他们制定了规则，我们是工程师，我们不会质疑他们制定的规则。我们只想解决我们明确定义的问题，看到一个有序的世界，即使这是别人的命令。
That night I stood at the heat transfer solution board and copied down answers to the latest set of problems. It still annoyed me that they didn't just hand these solutions out. But they make the rules and we're engineers and we don't question the rules they make. We just want to solve our clearly definable problems and see an orderly world, even if it's someone else's order.
解决方案板放在一个带锁的玻璃柜中，柜子下面是一盏嗡嗡作响的荧光灯。它前面有一个小壁架，可以放你的笔记本。灯只照亮了板子，走廊的灯光很暗，所以解决方案板就成了它自己的小小思想世界。
The solution board is in a locked glass case, under a buzzing fluorescent lamp. There's a little ledge in front of it for your notebook. The lamp illuminates just the board and the hall lights are dimmed, so the solution board becomes its own little world of thought.
格雷格·韦伯斯特也在同一班，他站在解决方案板的另一端。足球赛季结束后的一个周日早上，我在餐厅遇见了他。他参加了我的三门课程和另外两门课程。
Greg Webster, also in the class, was at the other end of the solution board. I'd met him in the dining hall one Sunday morning after the end of the soccer season. He was enrolled in my three classes, plus two others.
“你的钱还剩多少？”我问。
"How's your money holding out?" I asked.
“我在罗克韦尔航天飞机部门工作了两年，攒下的钱足够我在这里呆一整年。但我宁愿不花光我的积蓄。”
"I've got enough saved up in the bank from my two years working on the space shuttle at Rockwell to last the whole year here. But I'd rather not deplete my savings."
我怎么能指望能与一位曾经在航天飞机上工作过的人竞争呢？我很纳闷。他可能会在这里获得博士学位，五年后，当我在看电视时，他就会微笑着挥手，以任务专家的身份登上发现号。
How can I hope to compete with somebody who's worked on the space shuttle? I wondered. He'll probably get a Ph.D. here and in five years I'll be watching TV and he'll be smiling and waving as he walks onto Discovery as a mission specialist.
“你呢？”他问。
"How about you?" he asked.
我该告诉他关于 Weare 的事情吗？或者告诉他我将申请的其他部门新闻简报？他是一个潜在的朋友，但也是一个潜在的竞争对手。
Should I tell him about Weare? Or about the other department newsletter listings I'll apply to? He's a potential friend, but also a potential competitor.
我抄完了高级问题 8 的解决方案，并把我的所有线索告诉了格雷格。
I finished copying the solution to Advanced Problem 8 and told Greg all my leads.
他以同样的方式回答道。“这让我想起来了，”他说。“斯隆汽车实验室的弗兰克·韦斯特正在找人。他们刚刚与一些发动机公司签订了一份大合同，负责一些燃烧工作。我今天刚和他谈过。我本来会接受的，但看起来他真的在找一个能干的人来开展实验。我想等一些更理论化的东西。”
He replied in kind. "That reminds me," he said. "Frank West in the Sloan Auto Lab is looking for someone. They just got some big contract with a bunch of engine companies to do some combustion work. I just talked to him today. I would have taken it but it seems like he's really looking for a wrench turner to get the experiment going. I want to hold out for something more theoretical."
“他的名字怎么拼写？”
"How do you spell his name?"
11 月 18 日星期三
Wednesday, November 18
韦斯特的办公室一尘不染，每本书都整齐地摆放在学院规定的木制书架上，书架上有玻璃木框封面，可以拉开和放下。一幅描绘狩猎场景的挂毯挂在刷成白色的煤渣砖墙上。整个地方闻起来就像一个卡车停靠站。
West's office was immaculate, with every book perfectly in place in the institute-issue wooden bookshelves with glass-in-woodframe covers that pulled out and down. A tapestry depicting a hunting scene hung on the white-painted cinderblock wall. The whole place smelled like a truck stop.
“多么漂亮的办公室啊，”我说。
"What a beautiful office," I said.
“谢谢，”他回答道。“自从大三那年在荷兰的一次城堡拍卖会上买了十张挂毯以来，我就一直在做挂毯生意。我把它们带回了这里，然后以五倍的价格卖了出去。”
"Thank you," he answered. "I've been trading in tapestries ever since I bought ten of them at a castle foreclosure sale in Holland during my junior year. I brought them back here and sold them for five times what I paid for them."
我把简历递给他，他看了看，满意地点点头。我等着他问我关于我的研究项目的问题。
I handed him my resume and he looked through it, nodding approvingly. I waited for a question from him about my research projects.
“你似乎经常骑自行车，”他指的是我简历上写的在意大利北部骑了六个月自行车的记录。“我高中时曾是德克萨斯州自行车冠军。你用扳手一定很厉害。”
"You seem to have done a lot of bicycling," he said, referring to the entry in my resume about having cycled in northern Italy for six months. "I was a Texas state cycling champion when I was in high school. You must be pretty good with a wrench."
我认为，要尽其所能地利用这一点。
Milk this for all it's worth, I thought.
“嗯，在过去的几年里，我把自行车上的每一个轴承都拆开，清洗，重新润滑，然后重新组装，大约三次。”
"Well, I've taken apart every bearing in my bicycle, cleaned, regreased them, and reassembled them about three times in the past few years."
“很好。你愿意为我工作吗？”
"Good. How'd you like to work for me?"
“我很乐意，”我热情地回答。
"I'd love to," I answered enthusiastically.
“太棒了，”他说。“资金将于 1 月第一周开始发放。欢迎加入！”
"Fantastic," he said. "The funding starts the first week in January. Welcome aboard!"
我和他握手，摇摇晃晃地走过通往发动机实验室的走廊，走下楼。首先映入眼帘的是一根直直地躺在地板中央、与我的腰部齐高的活塞。我心里的紧张感又紧了些。但随后，我那 5 万美元债务的清晰画面便消失在了现实中。
I shook his hand and walked downstairs a little unsteadily past the corridor to the engine lab. The first thing I saw, lying vertically in the middle of the floor, was a piston as high as my waist. The knot in my stomach tightened some more. But then a clear picture of my $50,000 debt dissolved into the concrete.
我对自己唱道：
I sang to myself:
我有钱
I got money
我得到了资金
I got funding
我收到了 RA
I got an R.A.
谁还能要求更多吗？
Who could ask for anything more?
章节
C H A P T E R
6
6
决赛
Finals
12 月初，斯蒂芬妮的来信到了。“我以为你是个好人……我以为你很单纯……我以为你不是一个自负的人。事实证明我错了。”
In early December the letter from Stephanie arrived. "I thought you were a nice person.... I thought you were innocent.... I thought you were not an egotist. Evidemmentje m'en Buis trompe. I was wrong."
很高兴看到她能接受这一点。
It's good to see she took it so well.
白天越来越短，吉夫托普洛斯的问题也越来越长。往返奥尔斯顿的路上很冷。我的公寓也很冷。纪念大道上发电厂的烟越来越浓，越来越浓，到了晚上，冬天的初风把烟吹得越来越远。
The days became shorter and shorter, Gyftopoulos's problem sets longer and longer. It was cold on the rides to and from Allston. My apartment was cold. The smoke from the power plant on Memorial Drive was thicker, billowier, and at night it was blown more and more to the side by the early winds of winter.
学期还剩三周。两周的课程，一个周末，周一休息，然后是期末考试。麻省理工学院没有阅读时间。技术是累积的；如果你能做完最后一组作业，你就可以参加考试了。
Three weeks left in the term. Two weeks of classes, a weekend, Monday off, and then finals. There is no reading period at MIT. Technology is cumulative; if you can do the last problem set, you're ready to take the exam.
他们调整时间表以避免冲突，但如果你有三个课程，那么考试很有可能在第一天早上进行，下午进行，第二天早上进行。我的考试就是：流体、热、热。
They juggle the schedule to try to prevent conflicts, but there is a finite probability that if you have three classes, one exam will fall on the first morning, one that afternoon, and one the second morning. Mine did: Fluids, Thermo, Heat.
我在图书馆四楼学习，在主楼层的楼下，那里是图书管理员的办公室。那里没有窗户，没有干扰。
I studied in the fourth floor of the library, downstairs from the main level, where the librarians' offices were. It was windowless and free of distractions.
对于热传导和传热学，我复印了公式和问题解决方案的图片，并将它们钉在索引卡上。它们可能有助于我识别模式。虽然我还没有完全理解，但我可以在考试时参考它们。
For Thermo and Heat Transfer, I xeroxed formulas and pictures of problem solutions and stapled them to index cards. They might help me recognize the patterns. Short of full understanding, I could refer to them at exam time.
第一个星期六，艾克·托马斯的福音歌唱团在克雷斯吉礼堂演唱。艾克的办公室就在传热实验室马特办公室的拐角处。他在密歇根州立大学读本科，我们有时会在罗森诺的课前和课后聊天。音乐会上的小观众大多是黑人学生和他们的家人。歌声欢快、充满爱意，我感到温暖和宾至如归，仿佛回到了北卡罗来纳州。
The first Saturday, Ike Thomas's Gospel singing group sang in Kresge Auditorium. Ike's office was around the corner from Matt's in the heat transfer lab. He'd done his undergrad work at Michigan State, and we sometimes chatted before and after Rohsenow's class. The small audience at the concert was comprised mostly of black students and their families. The singing was joyous, loving, and I felt warm and at home, as if I were back in North Carolina.
艾森豪威尔弹奏着钢琴，演唱了《奇异恩典》，他浑厚洪亮的嗓音与低音产生共鸣，仿佛在荒野中呐喊。
Ike played the concert grand piano and sang "Amazing Grace," his rich, sonorous voice resonating with the bass chords, like a voice crying out in the wilderness.
接下来的一周，艾克和我被邀请参加一场关于传热的学习班。班上有四个人住在阿什当楼，那是马萨诸塞大道和纪念大道拐角处的研究生宿舍。其中一人在马特的办公室里有一张办公桌。事实上，我是偶然听说这个学习班的，于是就主动邀请了，然后问艾克是否想一起去。
The following week Ike and I were invited to a study session in heat transfer. Four of the guys in the class lived in Ashdown House, the graduate student dorm at the corner of Mass Ave. and Memorial Drive. One of them also had a desk in Matt's office. Actually, I had heard about the study session by accident and sort of invited myself and then asked Ike whether he wanted to come along.
原来，这些家伙从学期开始就每周聚会一次，却没有邀请我们中的任何一个人。这样的事情能让你知道谁是你的朋友。
It turned out that these guys had been meeting once a week since the beginning of the term and hadn't invited either of us. It's things like this that let you know who your friends are.
我们六个人围坐在休息室的一张桌子旁。他们四个人飞快地完成了本周的推荐无评分作业，足以表明他们整个学期都跟上了课堂的节奏。坐在桌子首位的那个学生在椅子上身体前倾，双脚交叉放在椅子下面，上面的那只脚像两个月前在图书馆学习半导体物理的亚洲学生一样颤抖。
The six of us sat around a table in one of the lounges. The four of them blasted through the week's recommended ungraded assignment quickly, enough to show that they'd all been keeping up with the pace of the class all term. The one at the head of the table leaned forward in his chair, his feet crossed beneath the chair, the upper foot shaking like the Asian semiconductor physics student's in the library two months before.
艾克看起来和我一样沮丧。大约一个小时后，会议结束了，我和艾克离开时互相安慰。
Ike looked as discouraged as I felt. The session ended after about an hour, and as Ike and I left, we commiserated.
“那些人都会拿 A 的，”我说，“那至少会让我排名更靠后。”
"Those guys will have A's, every one of them," I said. "That'll surely push at least me way back in the standings."
“是的，他们似乎确实知道自己在做什么，”他说。“这个地方有时会让我感到沮丧。但我只是努力记住我小时候南卡罗来纳州的奶奶曾经对我说的话。”
"Yeah, they do seem to know what they're doing," he said. "This place gets me down sometimes. But I just try to keep re membering what my grandma from South Carolina used to say to me when I was little."
我问他她说了什么。
I asked him what she said.
“上帝没有创造垃圾。”
"God didn't make no junk."
最后一个星期二之前的那个星期六早上，那位正在为他的本科论文建造踏板驱动的船员船壳的大四学生正准备与他的论文导师大卫·戈登·威尔逊教授一起将它发射出去。我 9:30 在办公室学习传热学，但当他们问我是否愿意帮忙时，我答应了。我快要放弃了，开始觉得再也没有办法为考试做准备了。这是一种饱和、倦怠和一种感觉的结合，如果你现在还不知道，那么到星期二你也绝对不会知道。此外，我想，这可能有助于在威尔逊那里得到一些加分。谁知道呢，也许有一天他会给我的试卷评分。
The Saturday morning before final Tuesday, the senior who had been building the pedal-powered crew shell for his undergraduate thesis was preparing to launch it with Professor David Gordon Wilson, his thesis adviser. I was in my office at 9:30 studying heat transfer, but when they asked whether I wanted to help I said yes. I was reaching the resignation point, when you begin to think that there's nothing more you can do to study for exams. It's a combination of saturation, burnout, and a feeling that if you don't know it by now there's no way you're going to know it by Tuesday. Besides, I thought, it might help to score some brownie points with Wilson. Who knows, he might be grading a test of mine someday.
“你们俩为什么不把船开出来，我把车开过来，”威尔逊说。他总是那么兴高采烈。我们把船员的船舱装到他那辆 70 年代早期的红色大众旅行车的车顶上。船看起来有点奇怪，螺旋桨在空中，玻璃纤维支腿浮筒绑在船边，全都倒过来了。
"Why don't you fellows bring the boat out, and I'll bring my car around," Wilson said. He was always so chipper. We loaded the crew shell onto the roof of his early '70s red VW station wagon. The boat looked a little funny with the propellor up in the air and the fiberglass outrigger pontoon strapped to the side, all upside down.
看到身着粗花呢夹克、说着英国口音的威尔逊，我感觉自己就像早期航空业的先驱者之一，正走向试验场，像新闻片里的演员一样快步走着。
With Wilson and his tweed jacket and British accent, I felt like one of the pioneers of early aviation going out to the testing ground, walking fast like on the newsreel.
当我们慢慢地绕着街区驶向船屋时，威尔逊说：“螺旋桨的设计与保罗·麦克雷迪在 Gossamer Condor 上使用的设计相同。它在低流速下非常高效。我们希望这次测试能够成功，然后下一位学生可以将其改造成踏板驱动的水翼船。我的计算表明，一个人踩踏板水翼船的速度应该比哈佛大学八人船艇的速度更快。”
As we slowly drove around the block to the boathouse, Wilson said, "The propellor is based on the same design that Paul Mac- Cready used on the Gossamer Condor. It's very efficient at low flow rates. We can hope that this test will be successful, and then the next student can work on making it into a pedal-powered hydrofoil. My calculations have shown that it should be possible for one person pedaling a hydrofoil to go faster than the Harvard varsity eight-oared shell."
我仔细一想，这倒是有道理。桨手们花了很多时间才将桨恢复到动力行程。如果你用脚蹬船，你就会一直处于动力行程中。
It did make sense when I thought about it. The oarsmen spend a lot of time just returning their oars to the power stroke. If you pedal the vessel, you're always in the power stroke.
赛季已经快要结束了，查尔斯号上已经没有船员了，只有一名女子在训练，她正在为奥运代表队训练，训练结束后站在船库的码头上。天气寒冷，阴沉，感觉像下雪了一样。
There were no crew shells on the Charles that late in the season, just one woman, who was training for the Olympic team, standing on the dock at the boathouse after she'd finished her workout. It was cold and gray and felt like snow.
威尔逊、我和那个本科生把浮桥连接到码头上的船员艇上，船员艇放在两个锯木架上，螺旋桨通过自行车链条固定在船中间的链轮上。链条穿过艇底部一个半美元大小的洞。
Wilson and I and the undergrad attached the pontoon to the crew shell on the dock, with the crew shell sitting on two sawhorses and the propellor on its strut attached by the bicycle chain to the sprocket in the middle of the boat. The chain went through a halfdollar-size hole in the bottom of the shell.
我们把壳放入水中并静置几秒钟。
We put the shell in the water and let it sit there for a few seconds.
“先生，它好像进水了，”这位本科生说道，棕色的淤泥正从链条的洞里流出来。
"It appears to be taking on water, sir," the undergrad said as the brown muck flowed through the hole for the chain.
“是的，好吧，水没那么快涌进来；我们只需要快速进行测试，”威尔逊说。“如果有必要，我们可以在测试间隙将水舀出来。”咬紧牙关。噼里啪啦。再见。
"Yes, well, the water isn't coming in that fast; we'll just have to do our test runs quickly," Wilson said. "We can bail it out between runs if necessary." Stiff upper lip. Pip pip. Cheerio.
本科生先出发。当他坐在船上时，水流来得更快。他蹬了几圈，半分钟后就沿着码头前进了 8 英尺。然后链子掉了下来。
The undergrad went first. When he sat in the boat, the water came in a little faster. He pedaled for several revolutions and in half a minute he moved 8 feet along the dock. Then the chain fell off.
“好吧，这至少是一个概念验证，”威尔逊说。“螺旋桨的设计目的是在船速达到每小时 8 英里时提供最大功率，所以我们可能需要考虑如何达到这个速度。”
"Well, that at least is a proof of concept," Wilson said. "The propellor is designed to give maximum power at about 8 miles an hour boat speed, so we may need to give some thought as to how to get up to that speed."
我们把贝壳捡起来放水，轮到威尔逊了，结果也差不多。然后轮到我了。
We picked up the shell to let the water out, and Wilson took his turn, with similar results. Then came my turn.
我坐进船里时，船“咔嚓”一声响了。我看到两条裂缝从螺旋桨孔的两侧向外延伸，水涌入的速度比威尔逊在船上时更快。
"Craaack" went the boat as I sat down in it. I saw the two fracture lines move out from either side of the propellor hole and the water came in faster than it had when Wilson was in the boat.
“也许你现在应该拍照，”我说。
"Maybe you should take the picture now," I said.
我对着镜头微笑，蹬了四下踏板，移动了几英尺，从船座滑回码头。
I smiled for the camera, pedaled four strokes, moved a couple of feet, and slid back over onto the dock from the boat's seat.
当我们把船打捞上来时，威尔逊说道：“嗯，这就是设计。你有一个想法，知道如何做某件事，然后你建造它、测试它，最后解决你发现的问题。”
As we lifted the boat out, Wilson said, "Well, that's what design is. You have an idea for how to do something, you build it, you test it, and then you fix the problems that you discover."
那天午夜，也就是周二考试前的最后一个周六，麻省理工学院交响乐团在 7 号大厅演奏了莫扎特的单簧管协奏曲。我们数百人挤在地板上，寻求安慰，寻求逃离寒冷和孤独的科学研究的庇护。
That midnight, the last Saturday before Tuesday's exams, the MIT symphony played Mozart's clarinet concerto in Lobby 7. Hundreds of us huddled on the floor-huddled masses, seeking comfort, seeking refuge from the cold and lonely study of science.
杜邦健身房里有液体和热疗。我们争夺着钟形曲线上的位置，现在我们不再打篮球，而是解决问题。
Fluids and Thermo were in Du Pont Gym. We were competitors for position on the bell curve, now not playing basketball but rather working problems.
补液比赛于 9:00 开始。我祝卡洛斯、马特和玛丽好运，然后把打印好的文件袋递给我，这时夏皮罗通过扬声器说：“你们可以开始了。”他的声音回荡在拱形的飞机库形状的房间里。这是自行车比赛的最后一公里。
Fluids started at 9:00. 1 wished Carlos and Matt and Mary good luck and turned over the typed packet when Shapiro said, "You may begin," over the loudspeaker. His voice echoed through the vaulted aircraft-hangar-shaped room. It was the last kilometer of the bicycle race.
杰马耶勒和夏皮罗将小册子分发给了我们右边的 225 和 220 班的本科生流体课。杰马耶勒对夏皮罗说：“我们最好不要把任何测试搞混了。”
Gemayel and Shapiro handed out the booklets to two twenty five and to two twenty, the undergraduate Fluids class to our right. Gemayel said to Shapiro, "We better not get any of the tests mixed UP."
夏皮罗苦笑着回答道：“这对结果不会有任何影响。”
Shapiro answered wryly, "It wouldn't make any difference to the results."
我翻过打印好的试卷，上面又写着“打开书本……打开笔记”。他们不会费心让你死记硬背。相反，他们让你使用任何你能携带的东西，而且无论如何都让问题变得不可能。
I turned over the typed exam that said again at the top "Open book ... open notes." They don't bother to make you memorize things here. Instead they let you use anything you can carry and make the problems impossible anyway.
和往常一样，我浏览了试卷，寻找一些看起来可行的内容。令人惊讶的是，夏皮罗在试卷前面放了一些礼物点。这些只是一般的信息问题，我可以在整洁的笔记中查找的内容，或者我掌握的与我解决测试问题的能力无关的一般概念。在第一个小时内，我记下了三分之一的点数。
As usual, I looked through the exam for something that looked doable. Surprisingly, Shapiro had put some gift points up front. These were just general information questions, things I could look up in my neatly copied notes, or the general concepts that I had mastered independently of my ability to solve test problems. Within the first hour I had a good third of the points down.
我感觉有点兴奋——明亮的灯光照在白纸上，刚削好的二号铅笔在纸上有序地画着。这可以说是考生的兴奋，就像在自行车比赛中，车队带着你以前所未有的速度前进。房间里有一种专注的精神氛围，300 名非常聪明的人围着你，安静、快速地思考，没有杂念。你推理，看着你画的画，写下公式，倾听你需要的想法。
I felt a little high-the bright lights shining down on the white paper as the freshly sharpened number two pencil makes its ordered impressions on the page. Call it test-taker's high, like in a bicycle race when the pack is carrying you along faster than you've ever gone before. There's a focused mental atmosphere in the room, 300 very bright people around you, thinking quietly, quickly, with no random thoughts. You reason, look at the drawings you've made, write the formulas down, and listen for the ideas you need.
十点十分，史密斯教授向参加本科生热能期末考试的学生宣布：“问题 3b 有一个拼写错误。”他的声音在机库里回荡。“应该是每克 12 卡路里，而不是每克 120 卡路里。”显然，一个走上前来和史密斯交谈的人发现了这个错误。
At ten after ten, Professor Smith had an announcement for the students taking the undergraduate Thermo final: "There's a typo on Problem 3b." His voice echoed up and down the hangar. "It should be 12 calories per gram, not 120 calories per gram." Evidently a guy who'd walked up to talk to Smith had spotted the error.
我想，为什么他们在发出试卷之前不校对一下呢？
Why don't they proofread the tests before they give them out, I thought.
问题部分占 100 分中的 60 分，涉及我在前两次考试中见过的相同杆。这一次，为了增加第三级难度，杆子在旋转：
The problem section, worth 60 of the 100 points, involved the same shaft I'd seen on the previous two exams. This time, to add a third degree of difficulty, the rod was spinning:
“(a) 找到轴和套筒之间的油流可被视为粘稠的最大转速。（30 分）(b) 找到转速达到 3,600 rpm 时轴上的升力。（30 分）”
"(a) Find the maximum speed of rotation at which the oil flow between the shaft and the sleeve can be considered viscous. (30 points) (b) Find the lifting force on the shaft as the rotation speed reaches 3,600 rpm. (30 points)"
考试的兴奋感就这么多。
So much for test-taker's high.
在考试的剩余时间里，我尽力尝试，估计总分会在 70 分左右。希望平均分能低一些。
I gave it the institute try for the rest of the exam period and figured my total would be around 70. Time to hope that the average was low.
热力学稍微难一点。不过，我感觉自己学到了一些东西。我知道如何实现“能量平衡和熵平衡”，正如吉夫托普洛斯所强调的那样。我知道如何绘制矩形和进出矩形的箭头，以表示进出矩形的热量或机械能。其余的都是数字运算细节。
Thermo was a little harder. It did feel like I'd learned something, though. I knew how to do an "ennergy balance and an ennntropy balance," as Gyftopoulos had emphasized. I knew how to draw rectangles and arrows going in and out of them to symbolize the heat or mechanical energy going into or out of the rectangle. The rest was number-crunching detail.
我们考试的时候，吉夫托普洛斯在体育馆里走了一圈。他在每张桌子前停下来，看了看我们每个人的表现。这是他表达关心的方式，但让人感到不安。当他来到我的桌子旁时，他轻轻地把一只手放在我的肩膀上，另一只手放在桌子上，然后俯身看着我在白纸上用铅笔画的第二个字迹。
Gyftopoulos walked around the gymnasium as we took the test. He stopped at each table and briefly looked at how each of us was doing. It was his way of showing he cared, but it was unnerving. When he came to my table he gently put one hand on my shoulder, one on the table, and leaned over to look at my number two pencil impressions on the white page.
“嗯嗯，”他看着我写字，赞许地说道。
"Umhmmmm," he said approvingly as he watched me write.
这比“啧啧”要好得多，但我真的很想转向他并说：“哇哦？我能帮你吗？”
It was better than "Tsk Tsk," but I really wanted to turn to him and say, "Eeeeyesss? May I help you?"
不过，你不要和这些人开玩笑；当然，在他们对边界等级做出所有判断之前不要这样做。
You don't joke around with these guys, though; certainly not before they've made all their judgment calls for the borderline grades.
第二天，从我翻阅罗森诺的期末考试卷的那一刻起，我就知道这是第四次长距离航行。我帮助威尔逊和他的本科论文学生完成了那艘愚蠢的船，这也很好。考试有一半是关于用电阻法确定辐射热通量。罗森诺在前两次讲座中提到了这一点。
The next day, from the moment I turned over Rohsenow's final, I knew it was fourth and long yardage. It had been just as well that I'd helped Wilson and his undergraduate thesis student with that stupid boat. Fully half the test dealt with the resistance method of determining amounts of radiation heat flux. Rohsenow had touched on this during the last two lectures.
这个想法是，你可以把热表面想象成电池。温度越高，电池的电压就越高。不同物体吸收的热量不同，这取决于它们距离热表面有多远、有多大以及它们如何面对热表面。你把所有这些信息放入有效电阻中，然后你就可以求解方程组来得到各种热表面温度。
The idea is that you think of the hot surfaces as if they're batteries. The higher the temperature, the higher the voltage of the battery. Different fractions of the heat are absorbed by different objects, depending on how far away they are, how big they are, and how they face the hot surface. You put all that information into an effective electrical resistance, and then you can solve the set of equations for various hot surface temperatures.
啊哈。这就是他们所说的建模。你用方程来描述现象并改变参数。通常，你会用你知道如何从其他地方求解的方程来描述，就像辐射的电模拟模型一样。不幸的是，我从来没有掌握过电方程。我对它们的了解足以在二年级物理考试中重复问题，但不足以在期末考试前四天将这些知识转移到另一个领域，当时我还有另外两场考试要担心。
Aha. That's what they mean by modeling. You throw equa tions at the phenomenon and vary parameters. Generally, you throw equations that you know how to solve from somewhere else, as with the electrical analog model for radiation. Unfortunately, I had never mastered the electrical equations. I knew enough of them to parrot problems in sophomore physics exams, but not enough to transfer that knowledge to another field in the four days before the final when I had two other exams to worry about.
我花了三个小时才勉强完成另外两道题，只获得部分学分。看到小教室里的其他人做题速度如此之快，真是令人沮丧。如果你知道如何布置辐射问题，那么它们一定有很多、很多步骤。
I spent three hours scraping for partial credit points on the other two problems. It was discouraging to watch the other guys in the small classroom working so fast. The radiation questions, if you knew how to set them up, must have had many, many steps.
圣诞前夕，我评估了损失，首先是贝雷塔。如果有坏消息，我不想冒险再和吉夫托普洛斯拍一场戏。
The day before Christmas Eve I assessed the damage, starting with Beretta. If there was bad news, I didn't want to risk another scene with Gyftopoulos.
“与班上其他同学相比，你的期末成绩确实很低，”他故意说道。“有些人表现非常好，有些人表现很差。这次我们甚至不得不给你打 D 和 F ......我们商量了一下，决定给你 C 。”
"Your final score was really quite low in comparison with the rest of the class," he said deliberately. "Some people did very very well, and some did poorly. We even had to give some D's and F's this time.... We talked it over and decided to give you a C."
“有多少人完成了这门课程？”
"How many people finished the class?"
“45。”
"Forty-five."
我记得马特在第一堂课上用算法计算出来的 76 分。钟形曲线的下三分之一，也就是我本应处于中间的那三分之一，在第一次期中考试后就下降了，让我只能紧紧抓住队伍的后面，就像在驶去的火车车厢后面抓住栏杆一样。
I remembered Matt's algorithmic count of 76 at the first lecture. The lower third of the bell curve, the one that would have put me in the middle, had dropped after the first midterm, leaving me grasping at the back of the pack as one grasping for a railing on the back of a receding train car.
我下楼去了罗森诺的办公室。那里的消息肯定会更好。毕竟杰米是评分员，而且我们同属一个校内曲棍球队。
I went downstairs to Rohsenow's office. The news would surely be better there. Jamie was the grader, after all, and we were on the same intramural hockey team.
我坐在熟悉的座位上。罗森诺拿出了测试的曲线图。这是一张直方图，横轴是最终分数，纵轴是不同范围内人数的小 x，就像他在第一次测验后在黑板上画的一样。图表上有两个驼峰，一个以 90% 为中心，另一个以 75% 为中心。两个驼峰的左边是两个孤独的小 x，位于 60%。
I sat in the seat that was becoming familiar. Rohsenow pulled out the curve sheet from the test. It was a histogram, a graph with the final scores on the horizontal axis and little x's for the number of people in the different ranges extending vertically, like the one he'd drawn on the blackboard after the first quiz. The graph had two humps on it, one centered on 90 percent and another centered on 75. To the left of the two humps were two lone little x's at 60.
罗森诺解释了图表。“这些是分数，你看。现在杰米和我坐下来，我们看着图表，我们说，嗯，那个驼峰看起来像 A，那个驼峰看起来像 B。”他指着 90 分的驼峰和 75 分的驼峰。“然后我们看着这两个小 x，我们说，嗯，我们可以称它们为 B，但它们实际上看起来更像 C。你就是其中之一。”
Rohsenow explained the graph. "Here are the scores, see. Now Jamie and I sat down and we looked at the graph and we said, well, that hump looks like an A, and that hump looks like a B." He pointed to the 90 hump and the 75 hump. "Then we looked at these two little x's, and we said, well, we could call these a B, but they really look more like a C. You're one of those."
我觉得，这对 Jamie 来说是一件好事。通过在同一个校内队打球来博取影响力对 MIT 没有任何好处。在某种程度上，C 感觉很好。这是一个诚实的 C。我想知道另一个是谁。
Good for Jamie, I thought. Influence peddling by playing on the same intramural team doesn't do any good at MIT. In a way, the C felt good. It was an honest C. I wondered who was the other one.
“呃，这可能是个问题，先生，”我说。“我刚和贝雷塔教授谈过，他说我在热力学这门课上也得了 C。我不知道我在流体这门课上表现如何，但我怀疑那门课不能得 A。”
"Uh, this could be a problem, sir," I said. "I just talked to Professor Beretta, and he said that I got a C in Thermo, too. I don't know how I did in Fluids, but I doubt it was an A."
“如果你在我的课程上得了 C，在热力学课程上得了 C，那么趋势表明你在流体课程上也可能得 C。主题是相似的，”他说。
"If you have a C in my class and a C in Thermo, the trend would indicate you'll probably have a C in Fluids, too. The subject matter's similar," he said.
对于这个人来说，一切都是趋势，图表上的点和它们之间的线。
Everything's a trend to this guy-points on a graph with a line in between them.
我问道：“3C 对于我在麻省理工学院的未来意味着什么？”
I asked, "What would 3 C's mean for my future at MIT?"
“嗯，”他回答道，“你必须拿到 3.5 分才能从这里获得学位。这意味着你的 B 和 C 的分数必须至少一样多。所以如果你的平均成绩低于 3.5 分，我们就会对你进行留校察看。如果连续两个学期你的平均成绩低于 3.5 分，我们就会开始玩数字游戏。我们会试图计算出，在你完成所有课程后，从数学上来说，你是否有可能摆脱困境。如果这看起来不太可能，那么，我们会向你指出这一点，我们希望你能通过辞职来防止事情变得更糟。”
"Well," he answered, "you have to have a 3.5 to get a degree from here. That means you have to have at least as many B's as C's. So if your average ever goes below a 3.5, we put you on probation. If it goes under 3.5 for two terms in a row, we start playing a numbers game. We try to figure out whether it's mathematically possible for you to dig yourself out of the hole by the time you complete all your coursework. If it looks like a long shot, well, we point that out to you and we hope you prevent things from getting ugly by resigning."
对他来说，这一切都是那么的理所当然。当你处在每条钟形曲线的右侧时，就很容易理所当然，即使他们已经把奶油一圈圈地撇去，直到只剩下特别浓稠的奶油。
It was all so matter-of-fact to him. It's easy to be matter-offact when you've been on the right side of every bell curve, even after they've skimmed and skimmed until there's nothing but extra-rich cream left.
“从短期来看这意味着什么？”我问道。
"What does this mean in the short term?" I asked.
“首先，你会收到院长的一封信，”他说，“他会告诉你，你处于留校察看期，你应该来找我谈谈。”
"First of all, you'll get a letter from the dean," he said. "He'll tell you that you're on probation, and that you should come and talk to me."
缓刑。我能得到缓刑监督官的帮助吗？
Probation. Do I get a probation officer?
罗森诺继续说道：“但你现在正在跟我说话，所以你可以忽略这一点。下个学期只要努力拿几个 B 就行了。”
Rohsenow continued, "But you're talking to me now, so you can ignore that. Just try to get a couple of B's next term."
这则消息并没有给我带来太大的震撼。毕竟，商学院还是有的。我走向 31 号楼附近我锁自行车的地方，撞见了杰马耶勒。
The news didn't shake me up as much as it might have. There was, after all, always business school. I walked toward where I'd locked my bike near Building 31 and bumped into Gemayel.
“那么，我在流体方面表现怎么样？”我问道。
"So, how'd I do in Fluids?" I asked.
“好吧，我们真的应该在假期结束之前告诉你，”他说。
"Well, we're really not supposed to tell you until after the holidays," he said.
对。在他们打开圣诞礼物、在家里吃饱喝足之前，不要告诉他们他们是失败者。政策必须旨在保持高层建筑附近的人行道清洁。
Right. Don't tell them they're failures until they've opened up their Christmas presents and been well fed at home. The policy must be designed to keep the sidewalks near the tall buildings clean.
“噢，来吧。你可以告诉我，”我坚持道。“至少给我一点提示。”
"Aw, come on. You can tell me," I persisted. "At least give me a hint."
“呃，”他犹豫了一下，“你做得还不错。”
"Ehh," he hesitated, "you did okay."
我做得还行。也就是说得了 B。
I did okay. That meant a B.
章节
C H A P T E R
7
7
行会
The Guild
1982 年 1 月 2 日
January 2, 1982
上午 7:30 我敲开 Frank West 的门时，他已经喝了第二杯咖啡。这是我担任 RA 的第一天。担任 RA 需要每学期上两三门课，每周在实验室或电脑上工作大约 30 小时。作为交换，您可以获得免费学费和每月约 600 美元的津贴。研究工作最终会写到您的硕士或博士论文中，因此担任 RA 可谓一举两得。
7:30 A.m. Frank West was already on his second cup of coffee when I knocked on his door. It was the first day of my R.A. With an R.A., you take two or three classes per term and work about 30 hours a week in the lab or on a computer. In exchange, you receive free tuition and a stipend of about $600 each month. And the research work ends up in your master's or Ph.D. thesis, so an R.A. kills two birds with one stone.
“我来了，”我兴奋地说道。“你想让我做什么？”
"Here I am," I said enthusiastically. "What do you want me to do?"
“你的工作是提高快速压缩机的压缩比，从现在起我们将其称为 RCM。你需要重新设计它，对涡流率和湍流水平的测试矩阵进行实验，并研究参数对点火延迟的影响，”他轻快地回答道。
"Your job is to raise the compression ratio of the rapid compression machine, which from now on we'll call the RCM. You'll need to redesign it, conduct experiments over a test matrix of swirl rates and turbulence levels, and investigate parametric influences on ignition delay," he answered briskly.
咕噜。这家伙应该带上一本词汇表。
Gulp. This guy should come with a glossary.
韦斯特继续说道：“如果你想的话，你可以坐下来。我知道这是一项艰巨的任务。我们希望在二月份得到结果，以便及时参加研究赞助商的会议。你需要设计设备；尼克·维托罗将为你工作。我希望你让他忙起来。”
West continued, "You can sit down if you want. I know it's a big job. We want to get results in February, in time for the meeting of the research sponsors. You'll need to design the equipment; Nick Vittoro will be working for you. I want you to keep him busy."
当然。如果我不知道自己在做什么，我怎么能让别人忙起来呢？我这辈子从来没有设计过任何东西。
Sure. How can I keep anybody else busy when I don't know what I'm doing. I've never designed anything in my life.
“嗯嗯，”我说。
"Uh huh," I said.
“哦，还有实验室规则，”他补充道。“第一条规则是‘这是你的工作，不是我的。’第二条规则是‘我不接受任何借口’，第三条规则是‘实验室开放时间为 7:30 至 5:30，午餐时间半小时。’你应该能够在这些时间内完成所有的实验室工作。去年，哈佛大学物理系失去了一名学生，他在凌晨 2:00 睡着了，躺在实验的高压电源上。第二天他被发现死了。我们不希望这种事情发生在斯隆实验室。”
"Oh, and about lab rules," he added. "The first rule is 'It's your job and not mine.' The second is 'I don't take any excuses,' and the third is 'Lab hours are 7:30 to 5:30, with half an hour for lunch.' You should be able to get all your lab work done between those hours. Harvard's Physics Department lost a student last year when he fell asleep into his experiment's high-voltage power supply at 2:00 in the morning. He was found dead the next day. We don't want that kind of thing to happen here in the Sloan Lab.'
我也是。“嗯嗯。”
Me neither. "Uh huh."
“你可以在晚上使用电脑工作，阅读期刊文章。晚饭后可以尝试游泳半小时左右。我发现在那个时候锻炼可以减少我睡眠需求，让我精神饱满，可以再工作四五个小时。下楼来吧——我带你看看你的手机。”
"You can do computer work at night and read journal articles. And try taking a swim after dinner for half an hour or so. I've found that exercising at that time makes me need less sleep and wakes me up so I can work another four or five hours. Come on downstairs-I'll show you your cell."
这听起来太令人受限制了。这只是一个开始，也许不会有结束。马特告诉我，大多数研究生只想着让他们的导师批准他们的论文。真正的论文。不是你在春假期间写的商学院四十页的“主要论文”，而是一到两年的努力——如果一切顺利的话——韦斯特似乎会在签字前尽可能地逼我完成工作。
It sounded so confining. It was the start of what might not have an ending. Matt had told me that all most graduate students think about is getting their advisers to approve their theses. Real theses. Not a business school forty-page "major paper" that you write over spring break, but a year to two year's effort-if all went well-and West seemed like he'd squeeze as much work out of me as he could before signing.
穿过门口的活塞，实验室看起来就像一个小工厂，里面有车床、钻床、焊接站，上面还有一台在轨道上运行的起重机，用来移动非常重的物体。测试室是围绕主车间周围的小房间。每个房间都放着一个实验的设备。这就像黑帮电影里的监狱工坊场景，一个歹徒试图把发动机缸体砸向另一个歹徒。我甚至有自己的牢房。
Past the piston at the door the lab looked like a small factory, with lathes, drill presses, a welding station, and over it all, an overhead crane that ran on tracks to move the really heavy objects. The test cells were small rooms around the perimeter of the main shop. Each housed the equipment for one experiment. It was like a prison workshop scene in a gangster movie, where one gangster tries to drop the engine block on the other one. I even had a cell of my own.
不过，这种折磨是值得的。我一直擅长数学，但当涉及到机械方面时，我却不太擅长。高中时，我试图重建我的迷你自行车的引擎，因为我让机油过低导致它冻结，但这个项目以我把迷你自行车送到割草机店而告终。我在六年级时制作的模型火箭上升了 6 英寸，向右转向，然后坠毁了。我的车库总是一团糟，不像《大众机械》杂志上介绍的那样，所有工具都整齐地摆放在钉板上。
The ordeal would be worth it, though. I'd always been good in math, but when it came to mechanical things I was less than gifted. In high school I tried to rebuild the engine on my minibike after it froze when I let the oil get too low, but that project ended in my taking the minibike to the lawnmower shop. The model rocket I built in sixth grade went up 6 inches, veered to the right, and crashed. And my garage was always a mess, nothing like the ones featured in Popular Mechanics, where all the tools are neatly placed on pegboards.
不过，我可以继续骑自行车上路，对于韦斯特来说这就足够了。
I could keep my bicycle on the road, though, and that was enough for West.
他打开了牢房一扇战舰灰色的钢制双开门，临走前说：“就在这里。玩得开心！”
He opened one of the battleship-gray steel double doors to the cell and before he left said, "Here it is. Have fun!"
谢谢。这台机器是一堆灰色和棕色的金属罐、螺栓、管子、管道、电线、开关。我不知道从哪里开始。
Thanks. The machine was a mass of gray and brown metala tank, bolts, tubes, pipes, wires, switches. I had no idea where to start.
有人打开了机械车间中央架子上的收音机。播放的是格伦·米勒的《心情好》这首歌。
Somebody turned on the radio on the shelf in the center of the machine shop. The song was Glenn Miller's "In the Mood."
我看着那张用陈旧胶带贴在灰色水箱上的泛黄、破烂的纸。上面写着“快速压缩机。所有系统运行：1972 年 5 月 15 日。”在我青春期的时候，这台机器已经生锈了，现在我有两个月的时间让它恢复生机。
I looked at the yellowing, crumbling piece of paper attached with aged masking tape to the gray tank. It read "Rapid compression machine. All systems operational: May 15, 1972." The machine had been rusting while I'd been going through puberty, and now I had two months to bring it back to life.
“我们得进去，船长，”那个灰白头发的男人一边说，一边打开我牢房的第二扇双开门。他穿着一件蓝色工作服，扣子一直扣到翻领，一件蓝色实验室夹克和蓝色牛仔裤，还有一双可能是钢头的工作靴。他比我矮一点，拖着脚步走进我的牢房。“我是尼克·维托罗。你叫什么名字？”
"We gotta get some eh in hih, Cap'n," the man with gray hair around the edge of his baseball cap said as he opened the second double door to my cell. He wore a blue workshirt buttoned all the way up to the turned-up collar, a blue lab jacket and blue jeans, and work boots that were probably steel-toed. He was a little shorter than I and kind of shuffled into my cell. "I'm Nick Vittoro. What's your name?"
“胡椒白。”
"Pepper White."
“哦，是的，你是新来的学徒。我记得韦斯特教授提到过圣诞节后你会来。我告诉你一件事，船长，我们在这项工作上会吃点苦头。”
"Oh yeah, you're the new apprentice. I remember Professor West mentioning something about you coming along after Christmas. I tell you one thing, Cap'n, we're gonna be suckin' some wind on this job."
我喜欢他说话的方式。“有什么建议吗，从哪里开始？”我问他。
I liked the way he said we. "Got any suggestions on where to start?" I asked him.
“Showah。把它打开。抓住那台老式快速压缩机的灵魂。我们把 A 型起重机带过来，把它的前端拆下来。我们必须让它知道谁才是老大。”
"Showah. Take it apaht. Get yuh hands on the soul of that old rapid compression machine. Let's bring the A-frame hoist in here and we'll take the front end off it. We gotta let it know who's boss."
这个项目还没开始一个小时，我就学到了重工业最基本的概念之一：索具，也就是移动大型重物，但不要让它们掉在脚上或弄伤背部，有时两者兼而有之。这肯定就是他们称之为重工业的原因。
Not even an hour into the project and I was already learning one of the most basic concepts in heavy industry: rigging, or moving big heavy objects around without dropping them on your foot or wrecking your back or sometimes doing both. That must be why they call it heavy industry.
“记住，船长，”尼克说道，“只要你像你一样遵守法律，你就能又快又安全到达那里。”
"And remembah, Cap'n," Nick said, "you'll get there a lot fastuh and safuh if you keep the Lawd as yah pahtnah."
我们从我牢房对面铁丝网后面的备件区拿来了 A 型升降机。格伦·米勒停止演奏，播音员说：“这是你一生的音乐。”音乐给实验室增添了古朴的感觉。我们都知道发动机是可以工作的，那么还有什么可了解的呢？热门的东西在拐角处的电子实验室里。那里的技术很高，但还不成熟。但是如果没有真正的东西可以制造或控制，电子产品有什么用呢？比如一台快速压缩机。
We took the A-frame hoist from the spare parts area behind the chain-link fence across from my cell. Glenn Miller stopped playing, and the announcer said, "The music of your life." The music added to the lab's archaic feeling. We all know that engines work, so what's left to find out about them? The hot stuff was in the electronics labs around the comer. That's where the technology is high and not mature. But what good is electronics without something real to make or control? Such as a rapid compression machine.
真实汽车或卡车中的四冲程柴油发动机的活塞每发动机循环上下移动两次。活塞在气缸内上下移动的每次单程行程称为一个冲程。图中活塞位于气缸顶部。
A real four-stroke diesel engine in a real car or truck has a piston that moves up and down two times per engine cycle. Each one-way trip the piston makes up or down the cylinder is called a stroke. Figure the piston is at the top of the cylinder.
此时气缸的体积非常小，活塞向下移动时，一个阀门（称为进气门）打开，让空气进入。这称为进气冲程（气缸吸入空气）。当活塞接近进气冲程底部时，进气门关闭，活塞向上移动并压缩被关闭的阀门困在气缸中的空气。这是压缩冲程。“压缩比”是压缩冲程开始时活塞和气缸所包围的体积除以压缩冲程结束时的相同体积。
The volume of the cylinder is very small at that point, and a valve (called the intake valve) opens to let air in as the piston moves down. This is called the intake stroke (the cylinder takes in air). When the piston is near the bottom of the intake stroke, the intake valve closes and the piston moves up and compresses the air that's trapped in the cylinder by the closed valve. This is the compression stroke. The "compression ratio" is the volume bounded by the piston and the cylinder at the beginning of the compression stroke, divided by the same volume at the end of the compression stroke.
当活塞接近压缩冲程的末尾时，燃油喷射器将柴油喷入气缸。燃油蒸发并燃烧，燃烧产生的热量使压力进一步升高，并将活塞向下推。这就是动力冲程。
When the piston is near the end of the compression stroke, the fuel injector squirts diesel fuel into the cylinder. The fuel evaporates and burns, and the heat generated by the burning fuel raises the pressure even more and pushes the piston down. This is the power stroke.
一旦活塞到达底部，排气门就会打开，活塞将燃烧后的燃料从气缸中推到排气管。这就是排气冲程。
Once the piston bottoms out, the exhaust valve opens and the piston pushes the burned fuel out of the cylinder to the tailpipe. This is the exhaust stroke.
然后进气阀打开，循环重复。这是我在九年级时从百科全书中复述的科学报告中记住的。
Then the intake valve opens and the cycle repeats itself. That much I remembered from the science report I paraphrased from the encyclopaedia in ninth grade.
快速压缩机将模拟循环的压缩和燃烧部分。
The rapid compression machine would simulate the compression and combustion parts of the cycle.
在使用 A 型架之前，我在崭新的实验室笔记本上画了一张草图，记录我们如何安装它。如果出现任何问题，我们可以参考草图来分析发生了什么。如果我们的工作成功了，这张草图可能会对未来的 RCM 学生有所帮助。
Before using the A-frame, I made a sketch in my brand-new lab notebook to record how we rigged it. If anything went wrong, we could refer to the sketch to analyze what happened. If our work was successful, the sketch might be helpful for future generations of RCM students.
尼克同意了我的安排，我们开始工作。A 型架就位，链条缠绕在气缸上，他说：“好的，船长。从我的工具箱里拿出一把扳手，拧开螺栓。我会稳住链条。”
Nick agreed with my setup and we went to work. The A-frame in place and the chain fall wrapped around the cylinder, he said, "OK, Cap'n. Go get a wrench outa my tool box and undo the bolts. I'll hold the chain fall steady."
用力一拉，再加上身体的重量，螺栓就松动了。就在最后一个螺栓松动之前，尼克拧紧了链条。
The bolts loosened with hard tugs and some body weight. Nick tightened the chain just before the last one loosened.
“前气缸里有一个活塞，我们得把它拆下来，”尼克说。“来，用这把螺丝刀启动气缸。”
"There's a piston in the front cylinder that we gotta pull the cylinder offa," Nick said. "Here, use this screwdriver to get the cylinder started."
我把螺丝刀楔入两个法兰之间，然后轻轻将它们分开。随着气缸向前移动，镀铬轴每次出现约四分之一英寸。尼克和我慢慢将气缸从机器的其余部分移开。
I wedged the screwdriver between the two flanges and eased them apart. As the cylinder moved forward a chrome shaft appeared about a quarter of an inch at a time. Nick and I slowly worked the cylinder away from the rest of the machine.
尼克说：“船长，现在慢点，我们只剩下几英寸了。我们现在不想弄弯那根轴。如果我必须再做一根新的，那会拖慢进度。”
Two feet out, Nick said, "Easy now, Cap'n, we got just a couple more inches. We don't wanna bend that shaft now. It'd slow things up for me to have to make a new one."
我们轻轻地、缓慢地将气缸从活塞上拆下来，轴完好无损。“让我们把这个东西搬到工作台上去，”他说，然后我们把 A 型架和气缸搬到工作台对面。
Gently, slowly we freed the cylinder from the piston, leaving the shaft unscathed. "Let's bring this thing onto the workbench," he said, and we walked the A-frame and the cylinder opposite the bench.
“船长，你帮我扶住它，我把她吊起来，”尼克一边说，一边把链条的末端一次拉高一两英尺。几分钟后，他就把圆筒抬高到工作台的高度；然后我们用 A 型架跨在工作台上，把圆筒放下来。
"You hold it, Cap'n, while I hoist her up," Nick said, pulling the free end of the chain up a foot or two at a time. Within a few minutes, he had lifted the cylinder to the level of the bench; then we straddled the bench with the A-frame and lowered the cylinder.
“那东西是怎么工作的？”我指着升降机问尼克。
"How's that thing work?" I asked Nick, pointing to the hoist.
“这只是滑轮原理，”他说。“有点像在滑轮里有很多滑轮。我拉滑轮的一端，我要举起的东西就会移动一半。亚里士多德不是说过，如果他有足够多的滑轮，他就能移动整个地球吗？”
"It's just the pulley principle," he said. "It's sorta like theyah's a lot of pulleys in theyah. I pull on one end of the pulley and the thing I'm trying to lift goes half as fah. Wasn't it Aristotle who said that if he had enough pulleys he could move the world?"
我不知道尼克说的是否正确。不过，总体思路听起来似乎合理。“不过，我以为这些事情都是从工业革命开始的。”
I wondered whether Nick had his facts straight. The general idea sounded plausible, though. "I thought that stuff all started with the industrial revolution, though."
“不，船长，这种事情已经存在一段时间了。你认为中世纪的人是怎么建造这些大教堂的？他们肯定没有把所有石头都搬到山顶上去，”他回答道。
"No, Cap'n, this kind of thing's been around for a while. How do you think they built all those cathedrals in the Middle Ages? They sure didn't carry all those rocks to the top," he answered.
他说得有道理。滑轮和杠杆已经存在了四、五千年。它们是与车轮一起利用自然法则通过缩短距离来放大力量的第一步。
He had a point. The pulley and the lever had been around for four, maybe five thousand years. They were the first steps, along with the wheel, in using the laws of nature to magnify force by shrinking distance.
“好了，现在就到此为止了，船长。该吃面包了。你想从咖啡店买点什么吗？”
"Well, that's enough for now, Cap'n. Time for my roll. You want anything from the coffee shop?"
“不用了，尼克。我想我会留在这里，试着弄清楚这些碎片有什么用处。”
"No thanks, Nick. I think I'll stay here and try to figure out what these pieces do."
“好的，”他说。“佩帕，我以前教过机械课。如果我们每天花点时间复习一下基础知识，也许能帮你入门。”
"Okeedokay," he said. "Say, Peppah, I used to teach a machining class. It might help you get your feet on the ground if we spend some time each day going over the basics."
“谢谢。我可能会接受你的提议。”独行侠有汤托，我有尼克。
"Thanks. I might take you up on that." The Lone Ranger had Tonto; I had Nick.
尼克走出门外，隔壁莱特兄弟风洞里传来的噪音听起来就像一队 B-17 轰炸机正在轰炸杜塞尔多夫。收音机里播放着“别和我以外的任何人坐在苹果树下”。我几乎以为会听到战争债券的广告。
Nick went outside and the noise from the Wright Brothers' wind tunnel next door sounded like a squadron of B-17's on their way to bomb Dusseldorf. The radio played "Don't Sit under the Apple Tree with Anyone Else but Me." I half expected to hear an ad for war bonds.
如果你不知道自己在做什么，那么要做的第一件事就是尽量表现得像你知道自己在做什么一样。这样可以为你赢得时间。于是我开始清理实验室。我从水槽中取出泛黄的纸张，用尼克的螺丝刀刮掉旧胶带。我清理了工作台上的所有旧垃圾。然后我列出了实验室里的物品清单，并将它们一件一件地整齐地摆放在两个工作台中的一个上。有些设备要么重生为丰田汽车，要么回到某个垃圾填埋场，变成铁矿石，否则将无用武之地。其他设备可能适用于新实验；如果可以回收利用，它们可能会节省数天、数周的时间。
If you don't know what you're doing, the first thing to do is to try to look like you know what you're doing. That buys you time. And so I started cleaning up the cell. I removed the yellowed sheet of paper from the tank and scraped the old masking tape away with Nick's screwdriver. I cleared all the old pieces of junk off the available bench space. Then I made a list of the items in the lab as one by one I put them neatly on one of the two workbenches. Some of the devices would never have another use before they either were reborn as a Toyota or went back to iron ore in a landfill somewhere. Others might be adaptable to the new experiment; salvageable, they might save days, weeks of time.
我找到了一件旧的蓝色实验室夹克，胸牌上写着“Don”。我穿上了它。在其中一张长凳下，我发现了韦斯特论文中的一堆旧笔记。它们杂乱无章，知道他表面上井然有序，但至少曾经有过一些混乱，让我感觉好了一些。
I found an old blue lab jacket with "Don" on the name patch. I put it on. Under one of the benches I found an old pile of notes from West's thesis. They were disorganized and it made me feel a little better to know that for all his surface order there had been at least some chaos in his life at one time.
所有金属都安装在一个 6 英寸厚的钢垫上，钢垫上从一端到另一端都有槽。这些槽提供了一个用来固定所有重物的地方。我开始清理槽中的金属碎片，但这太难了，可能浪费时间，所以我只是把钢垫顶部的灰尘掸掉。我高中的“车间”老师是一名铁工，如果他还活着的话，他可能会给我一些建议。
All the metal was mounted on a 6-inch-thick steel pad with slots running from one end to the other. The slots furnished a place to bolt down all the heavy stuff. I started to clean the little bits of metal out of the slots, but that was too hard and probably a waste of time so I just dusted off the top of the pad. My high school's "shop" teacher, an iron worker, might have had some tips for me if he were still alive.
很快就到了五点半。尼克和我用硼砂洗手，他摘下了棒球帽，露出了除了边缘灰白之外完全秃顶的脑袋。
Five-thirty came quickly. Nick and I washed our hands with Boraxo and he took off the baseball cap, showing a completely bald head except for the gray around the edges.
“明天见，船长，”他说。“精神饱满，准备好学习如何操作机器。”
"See you tomorrow, Cap'n," he said. "Be fresh and ready to learn how to machine."
“好的，尼克。祝你玩得开心。”
"Will do, Nick. Have a good one."
下午 7:45 游完泳后——我确实醒了——我在更衣室里看到了没有资助我的碎石工弗雷德里克·威尔。
7:45 P.M. After my swim-it did wake me up-I saw Frederick Weare, the rock crusher who didn't fund me, in the locker room.
“你找到资金了吗？”他问道。
"Have you found funding yet?" he asked.
“是的，事实上。我在斯隆汽车实验室研究快速压缩机。”
"Yes, as a matter of fact. I'm working on the Rapid Compression Machine in the Sloan Auto Lab."
“你真棒，”他说。“你的调查范围到底是什么？”
"Good for you," he said. "What exactly is the scope of your investigation?"
让这个东西运转起来，然后离开这里。“我会研究一下涡流率对柴油燃烧点火延迟的影响，”我说。
To get the thing to work and to get out of here. "I'll be looking at the effect of swirl rates on ignition delay in diesel combustion," I said.
“嗯嗯，”他再次点头。他没有再问有关柴油燃烧的问题，因为那超出了他的专业范围。“你会使用什么样的仪器？”
"Um hmmm," he nodded again. He didn't ask any more about diesel combustion because that was outside his realm of expertise. "What kind of instrumentation will you be using?"
“我还不太清楚——看，这是我的第一天，我只是想适应一下，”我回答道。
"I don't know exactly yet-see, this was my first day and I'm just trying to get oriented," I answered.
“嗯，听起来很有趣。祝你好运。”
"Well, it sounds like a lot of fun. Good luck with it."
谢谢，弗雷德。也许有一天我们会合著一篇论文。
Thanks, Fred. Maybe we'll co-author a paper some day.
晚上 8:15 不吸取历史教训的人注定要重蹈覆辙。过去实验的论文放在巴顿工程图书馆的八楼。化学、电气、土木、核能、机械工程。一排排黑底打字纸，每页正面都有三个签名——作者、导师、研究生系主任。作者的名字用细细的白色大写字母写在侧面，还有完成的年份，最早可以追溯到 1940 年代。再往前，你就得去微缩胶片了。
8:15 P.M. He who fails to learn from history is doomed to repeat it. The theses of experiments past are on the eighth floor of the Barton Engineering Library. Chemical, electrical, civil, nuclear, mechanical engineering. Rows upon rows of black-bound typewritten pages, each with three signatures on the front-author, adviser, graduate department chairman. The name of the author is written on the side in skinny white capital letters, together with the year of completion, as far back as the 1940s. Any further back than that and you have to go to microfiche.
我从 West 的 Sc.D. '71 开始。那里有一些彩色照片，上面是闪烁的黄色火焰。Sc.D. 是科学博士，这比 Ph.D. 更有意义，因为汽车修理工更接近科学而不是哲学。只有麻省理工学院、斯坦福大学、加州理工学院和其他几所精选学校在文凭上提供 Sc.D. 而不是 Ph.D. 选项。它使超级精英们能够互相识别，而不必屈尊询问他们在哪里获得证书。
I started with West, Sc.D. '71. There were some color pictures of glowing yellow flames. An Sc.D. is a doctor of science, which makes more sense than a Ph.D. since auto mechanics is a lot closer to science than it is to philosophy. Only MIT, Stanford, Cal Tech, and a few other choice schools offer the option of Sc.D. instead of Ph.D. on the diploma. It enables the hyperelite to recognize each other without stooping to ask where they earned their credentials.
我查看了 West 论文后面的参考文献列表。他提到了 Pyra，1968 年，他的学士学位是在布拉格大学获得的。Pyra 没有任何图片，只有图表。我把这两本书都放在了我的书堆里。Pyra 提到了 Nayak，1963 年，开罗大学理学学士。Nayak 也有很多图表，他提到了 Rathle，1959 年。Rathle 于 1957 年在埃及亚历山大大学获得理学学士学位。Rathle 建造了 RCM。我和我的仪器都是 25 年前的。
I looked in the list of references in the back of West's thesis. He referred to Pyra, '68, whose B.S. was from the University of Prague. Pyra didn't have any pictures, just graphs. I put them both in my stack. Pyra referred to Nayak, '63-B.S., University of Cairo. Nayak had lots of graphs, too, and he referred to Rathle, '5 9. Rathle had received his B.S. from the University of Alexandria, Egypt, in 1957. Rathle had built the RCM. My apparatus and I were both twenty-five years old.
拉特尔的图表让我眼前一亮。这台机器有三个腔室。前气缸是燃烧发生的地方，尼克和我当天早些时候拆掉了它。前部的后部有“止回棘爪”，当轴到达冲程末端时，它可以抓住轴，防止它向后弹起或被爆炸的柴油压力向后推。中间气缸有压缩空气和一个比前活塞大四倍的活塞。更大的面积使整个轴能够向前移动，即使燃烧室的压力远高于油箱中的压力。
Rathle's diagrams made the scales drop from my eyes. The machine had three chambers. The front cylinder, where combustion took place, was what Nick and I had removed earlier in the day. The back part of the front part had "nonreturn pawls," which caught the shaft as it went to the end of the stroke and kept it from bouncing backward or being pushed backward by the pressure of the exploding diesel fuel. The middle cylinder had compressed air and a piston four times the size of the front piston. The bigger area enabled the whole shaft to move forward, even when the combustion chamber's pressure was much higher than the pressure in the tank.
后气缸内装有各种尺寸的环，并充满传动液。后气缸轴上的活塞会减慢整个轴的速度，使压缩冲程与真实发动机中的压缩冲程相似，在真实发动机中，活塞连接到旋转的曲轴上。
The back cylinder had various-size rings in it and was filled with transmission fluid. A piston on the shaft in the back cylinder would slow down the whole shaft to make the compression stroke similar to that in a real engine, where the piston is attached to a rotating crankshaft.
从 Rathle 开始，参考文献均在期刊中 - Taylor，1948 年；Selden，1937 年；Rothrock，1932 年；Moore，1922 年；Falk，1906 年。
From Rathle back the references were in journals-Taylor, 1948; Selden, 1937; Rothrock, 1932; Moore, 1922; Falk, 1906.
福尔克的机器是一个垂直的管子，里面装满了氢气。他的轴上有一个铅块，活塞上有绳状活塞环，用来密封活塞和气缸之间的间隙。他放下铅块，测量气体燃烧的温度。第一个版本很简单，几乎微不足道，但本质上和我那一大块灰色的金属是一样的。
Falk's machine was a vertical tube filled with hydrogen. His shaft had a lead weight on top, and the piston had rope piston rings to seal the gap between the piston and cylinder. He dropped the weight and measured the temperature at which the gas combusted. That first version was simple, almost trivial, but essentially the same as my large gray mass of metal.
福尔克 (Falk) 引用了勒夏特列 (LeChatelier)，如勒夏特列原理 (1888) 所述：“当对处于平衡状态的系统施加外力时，该系统会进行调整，以尽量减少施加力的影响。”顺其自然。
Falk referred to LeChatelier, as in Le Chatelier's Principle (1888) : When an external force is applied to a system at equilibrium, the system adjusts so as to minimize the effect of the applied force." Go with the flow.
我在《大英百科全书》中查找了狄塞尔。鲁道夫·狄塞尔（生于 1858 年，卒于 1913 年）是德国热能工程师，也是一位杰出的艺术鉴赏家、语言学家和社会理论家。在奥格斯堡技术学校时，他观看了一场中国古代打火棒的演示。打火棒的历史可以追溯到公元前 1000 年或更早，就像装在自行车车架上的自行车打气筒。将一片干树叶或一块干的易燃木块放在一端，将其封住，给打气筒一个良好的快速压缩，然后砰的一声，打火了。他的发动机的灵感就源于那次演示。
I looked up Diesel in Encyclopaedia Britannica. Rudolph Diesel (born 1858, died 1913), German thermal engineer, was also a distinguished connoisseur of the arts, a linguist, and a social theorist. While at the technical school in Augsburg, he saw a demonstration of the ancient Chinese fire stick. The fire stick, dating to 1000 B.C. or earlier, is like the bicycle pumps that fit on the frame of the bicycle. You put a dry leaf or a dry tindery piece of wood in one end, close it off, give the pump one good rapid compression, and pow, fire. From that demonstration came the idea for his engine.
我感觉自己身处一个好公司，继承着一种传统，一种遗产。
I felt I was in good company, carrying on a tradition, a legacy.
狄塞尔发明了发动机，积累了巨额财富，但投资不多，然后由于不明原因在前往伦敦的邮轮“德累斯顿”号上“从甲板上摔了下来”。
Diesel developed his engine, amassed great wealth, invested poorly, and for reasons unknown "apparently fell" from the deck of the mail steamer Dresden en route to London.
周三
Wednesday
“这是微米，”尼克说。“你用它测量物体的大小，以千分之一英寸为单位。真正高级的微米可以精确到万分之一，但我们只测量千分之一。”
"This heeyuh's a micrometer," Nick said. "You take this and you measure how big something is, in thousandths of inches. The real fancy ones go down to ten-thousandths, but we'll just do the thousandths."
千分之一英寸对我来说似乎小得不可思议——怎么能测量得如此精确？在那样的尺度上，还有什么重要的事情呢？
A thousandth of an inch seemed incomprehensibly small to me-how could anything be measured that precisely? How could anything matter on that scale?
尼克继续说道：“你这样握住千分尺，然后把两个销钉放在工件上，彼此相距很远。”工件是安装在车床上的一根金属棒。“你要让千分尺的两端刚好从工件上滑下来，然后读出读数。这样你就能知道还需要去掉多少千分之一。这根金属棒上有一点锈迹，我们可以把可乐倒在上面或把温度调低，把锈迹去掉。”
Nick continued, "You hold the micrometer like this, see, and you put the two pins just apart from each other on the workpiece." The workpiece was a bar of metal mounted in the lathe. "You want to make the two ends of the micrometer just slip off the workpiece and then you read it. That'll tell you how many thousandths you still need to take off. There's a little rust on this bar, and we can take that off by either pouring Coke over it or turning it down."
我想知道机械师对刮掉金属皮的表情和被拒绝的性格之间是否有某种联系。
I wondered whether there were any connection between the machinists' expression for scraping the skin off a piece of metal and being turned down as a person.
“首先，我们必须把刀具放入刀架中，”尼克继续说道。“这是切削刃，”他一边说，一边握着一英寸长的金属片，指着锋利的一面。“我们要把它用螺栓固定在机器上，然后转动这里的横向进给手轮，让它靠近工件。”
"First we gotta put the tool in the tool holder," Nick continued. "This here's the cutting edge," he said, holding the inch-long piece of metal and pointing out the sharp side. "We're going to bolt it into the machine and then bring it just up to the workpiece by turning the cross-feed handwheel here."
手轮上有刻度，手轮旋转一圈，连接切削刀具的金属块就会向工件移动十分之一英寸。旋钮上的刻度盘周围有 100 个刻度线。这 100 个刻度线划分了十分之一英寸，使您可以将切削刀具移动千分之一英寸。与千分尺一样，该装置可以放大空间。
The handwheel had gradations in it so that one revolution of the handwheel made the block of metal to which the cutting tool was attached move a tenth of an inch toward the workpiece. The dial on the knob had 100 hash marks around the outside. The hundred hash marks dividing up a tenth of an inch allow you to move the cutting tool a thousandth of an inch. Like the micrometer, the device magnifies space.
尼克将工具推进工件，然后向前移动千分之五。工具切开锈迹，露出下面纯净、干净的钢材。“现在，船长，慢慢转动这个曲柄，你将把整个杆的千分之五切掉。不过，我们先在上面涂点切削油。”
Nick advanced the tool to the workpiece and then moved it forward five thousandths. The tool cut a little sliver through the rust, showing the pure, clean steel underneath. "Now, Cap'n, turn this crank nice and slow and you'll take five thousandths off the whole rod. Let's put a little cutting oil on there first, though."
他从油罐里倒了几滴油，这种油看起来就像是工程师们用来给火车上油的那种。当工具接触到油罐时，油冒烟了，我慢慢地转动曲柄，当我从轴的长度上取下千分之一时，细长条形成了一条连续的钢丝。
He put a few drops from the oil can that looked like the kind engineers use to lubricate their trains. The oil smoked when the tool made contact, and I turned the crank slowly and the sliver made a continuous thread of steel as I removed the thousandths from the length of the shaft.
“非常好，船长。现在把工具拿回来，你可以再切掉一些千分之一来练习一下。”我又切掉了十分之一，在切掉十五分之一的地方，杆的长度明显变短了。
"Very good, Cap'n. Now bring the tool back and you can take some more thousandths off for practice." I took ten more thousandths off and the rod was noticeably smaller on the length where I removed the fifteen thousandths.
“今天的课程就这么多了，船长。我带了这本书给你看看，”尼克说着，递给我一本沾满油污的手册，这是他第一次上机械车间课程《实用机械加工》时用到的。
"That oughta be enough school for today, Cap'n. I brought in this book for you to take a look at," Nick said, handing me the grease-marked manual that he'd used in his first machine shop class-Practical Machining.
封面插图展示了十六世纪的工人操作脚踏车床的情景。首先是砖块，然后是滑轮、火棒，现在是车床——这些简单的想法已经存在了很长时间。
The cover illustration showed workers in the sixteenth century operating a foot-powered lathe. First the brick, then the pulley, the fire stick, now the lathe-simple ideas have been around for a very long time.
我走回牢房，在进店的路上遇见了玛丽。她穿着一件实验室夹克，上面写着她的名字，上面写着“Dynatech”。
I walked back to my cell and met Mary on her way into the shop. She wore a lab jacket with her name written on it, and above her name was written "Dynatech."
“嗨，唐，”她指的是我的实验室夹克。
"Hi, Don," she said, referring to my lab jacket.
“嗨，玛丽。你来这儿干什么？我以为你还是个助教呢。”
"Hi, Mary. What brings you to these parts? I thought you were still a teaching assistant."
“我跟你一样，在韦斯特获得了研究助理学位，”她说，“我在实验室的另一端与保罗·卡恩一起研究卡特彼勒发动机。”她看着尼克借给我的书，说：“开始做生意了？”
"I got an R.A. with West, just like you," she said. "I'm working with Paul Kahn on the Caterpillar engine at the other end of the lab." She looked at the book Nick lent me and said, "Taking up a trade?"
“我们就说这是我的经济衰退保险吧。”
"Let's just say it'll be my recession insurance."
“如果你想要经济衰退保险，你应该成为一名水管工。机械师将是最先被解雇的人。”
"If you want recession insurance you ought to become a plumber. Machinists will be the first to get laid off."
“是啊，我的能力越强越好。你想看看我的牢房吗？”
"Yeah, well, the more versatile I can be the better. Do you want to take a look at my cell?"
“当然可以，”她说。
"Sure," she said.
我打开了门。工作台上的棕色纸张和整齐摆放的设备和工具给她留下了深刻的印象。“看起来很专业，”她说。“那边墙顶上的裂缝是什么？”她问道。
I opened the doors. She was impressed by the brown paper on the workbenches and the neatly laid out equipment and tools. "It looks very professional," she said. "What's that crack up at the top of the wall there?" she asked.
“以前他们每次做测试的时候，这台机器都会把建筑物的一部分带走。它释放的力量就像一门小型大炮一样。”我回答道。
"The machine has taken part of the building with it every time they've done a test in the past. The forces released are like those from a small cannon," I answered.
“哇哦。小心点。我希望你在这里的时候不要发生爆炸。”
"Whoa. Be careful. I hope nothing blows up while you're in here."
我当时还没有意识到危险。然后我想起了韦斯特讲述的物理学家和激光的故事。马特·阿姆斯特朗告诉我，麻省理工学院的正式职业安全相当松懈，因为研究生应该是专业人士，而专业人士会照顾好自己。
The danger hadn't yet occurred to me. Then I remembered West's story about the physicist and the laser. And Matt Armstrong had told me that formal occupational safety at MIT is fairly lax because graduate students are supposed to be professionals, and professionals take care of themselves.
“我会小心的。我们可以看看你的牢房吗？”
"I'll be careful. Can we take a look at your cell?"
“当然可以，”当我们走到实验室的北端时，她回答道。
"Sure," she answered, as we walked to the north end of the lab.
我读了其他测试间门上的标牌：“恒容燃烧弹：资助方：能源部”；“方形活塞透明发动机：资助方：工业联盟”；“用于研究活塞环运动的透明气缸：资助方：通用汽车公司。”我问玛丽是否知道这些项目是如何获得资助的。
I read the signs on the doors of the other test cells: "Constant Volume Combustion Bomb: Sponsor: Department of Energy"; "Square Piston Clear Engine: Sponsor: Industrial Consortium"; "Clear Cylinder for Study of Piston Ring Motion: Sponsor: General Motors." I asked Mary whether she knew how these projects got funded.
“有几种途径。其中一些公司有研究预算，用于资助大学。汽车行业研究部门有一半的人都毕业于这里，他们在发放资助时会想起自己的伙伴。一些赞助商希望获得真正的成果，这些成果将直接应用于发动机，但他们主要追求的是概念上的进步和对过程的理解。教授和学生根据研究撰写的论文就是他们所需要的。此外，他们还拥有训练有素的研究人员，他们可以立即为通用汽车、克莱斯勒或福特开发产品。我们就是这样的。”
"There're several avenues. Some of these companies have research budgets that they spend on universities. Half the people in the automotive industry's research departments have degrees from here, and they remember their buddies when they give out the grants. Some of the sponsors expect real results, things that will directly apply to engines, but mostly they're after advances in concepts and understanding of the processes. They get that in the papers the professors and students write that are based on the research. Plus, they get well-trained researchers who can hit the ground running developing products for GM, Chrysler, or Ford. Here we are."
她打开了牢房的门，里面有一台蓝色的、刚漆过的发动机，大约有二十根电线将它连接到角落里一个看起来像计算机的东西上。
She opened the door to her cell, where there was a blue, newly painted engine with about twenty wires connecting it to a computery looking thing in the corner.
“那是什么？”我问。
"What's that?" I asked.
“这是实验室数据采集系统。安装在发动机上的传感器将数据发送到这里的小型计算机。然后它将数据文件下载到楼上的主机进行分析。”
"It's the lab data acquisition system. The sensors mounted on the engine send their data to the little computer here. Then it downloads the data files to the mainframe computer upstairs for analysis."
很简单。“到目前为止情况怎么样？”我问道。
Simple enough. "So how's it going so far?" I asked.
“相当不错，”她平静地说。“唯一的问题是，我的项目搭档是一个来自佐治亚理工学院的呆子。我不知道他是怎么被录取的。”
"Pretty good," she said quietly. "The only problem is that my partner on the project is a real dork from Georgia Tech. I don't know how he got accepted."
也许他与韦斯特谈论自行车。
Maybe he talked bicycles with West.
“好吧，我希望一切顺利，”我说。“我得回去工作了。现在每进步一分钟，就意味着我能更快地完成工作，然后继续我的生活。”
"Well, I hope everything works out all right," I said. "I've got to go back to work. Every minute of progress now means I'll finish that much sooner and be able to get on with my life."
我看了看机器正面的镀铬轴，那是我和尼克前一天拆下气缸时发现的。轴的三分之一处有裂缝，就在止回棘爪卡住它的肩部附近。压缩力已经对轴造成了损害。我把镀铬部分从轴的其余部分拧下来，把棒球棒大小的轴拿到尼克正在一块金属上钻孔的地方。
I looked at the chrome-plated shaft on the front of the machine, the shaft Nick and I'd unveiled when we removed the cylinder the day before. It had a crack about one-third of the way around it, right near the shoulder where the nonreturn pawls caught it. The force of the compressions had taken their toll. I unscrewed the chrome section from the rest of the shaft and carried the baseball-bat-size shaft to where Nick was drilling a hole in a piece of metal.
“问题来了，尼克。轴上有个裂缝。我们有什么办法可以修好它吗？我可不想一年后，当我快要完成我的实验时，这东西又坏了。”我说。
"Problem, Nick. The shaft's got a crack in it. Is there any way we can fix it? I don't want the thing to break off a year from now when I'm almost ready to finish my experiments," I said.
“我们可以不管它——它可能会一直保持笔直，直到断裂——或者我可以在整个轴上焊上一道焊珠。这会使它更坚固，但它可能会使轴弯曲一点。这取决于你。”
"We could leave it alone-it'll probably stay straight until it breaks-or I can weld a bead around the whole shaft. That'll make it stronger, but it'll probably bend the shaft a little. It's up to you."
“如果轴弯曲了，我们可以把它弯回去吗？”
"If the shaft bends, can we bend it back?"
“我们可以尝试一下，”他说。
"We can try," he said.
“好的。我们开始焊接吧。”
"OK. Let's go for the weld."
我们来到焊接区，尼克戴上他的小焊接帽和皮衣，这让他看起来像西班牙宗教裁判所的酷刑者。他递给我一副皮手套、一顶帽子和一个玻璃纤维焊接头盔，头盔上有一条经过处理的玻璃缝，可以透过缝隙观察焊缝。玻璃处理后，你只能看到焊缝，但看不到其他东西。
We went to the welding area and Nick put on his little welding cap and the leathers that made him look like a torturer in the Spanish Inquisition. He handed me a set of leather gloves, a cap, and a fiberglass welding helmet with a treated glass slit through which to look at the weld. The glass treatment allows you to see the weld but not much else.
“好的，船长。你拿着它，慢慢转动，我会把它焊接起来。如果你握住末端，你会离得足够远，那些金属就不会击中你，所以你不需要皮革。”
"OK, Cap'n. You hold it and turn it slowly, and I'll weld it. If you hold the end you'll be fah enough away an none of that metal will hit, so you won't need leathers."
我戴上头盔，尼克也一样。焊缝的亮光接触到了肩部的金属，我慢慢转动了轴杆。尼克花了大约两分钟才将轴杆焊接到周围，将暂时熔化的金属像蛋糕糖霜一样铺上一层。
I put on my helmet, as did Nick. The bright flash of the weld contacted the metal at the shoulder and I slowly turned the shaft. It took about two minutes for Nick to weld all the way around it, layering the temporarily molten metal like cake frosting.
“好了。这样就行了，”他说。“现在，在你做其他事情之前，先把它放进那边的那桶水里。”
"There. That should do it," he said. "Now before you do anything else with it, put it in that bucket of water over there."
我把焊接的一端放入桶中，它像水槽中的热煎锅一样闪着水光。
I put the welded end in the bucket, and it flashed the water like a hot frying pan in a sink.
“把它放在那里一会儿。那家伙确实很火辣，”尼克说。
"Keep it in there for a while. That guy's hot all right," Nick said.
蒸汽消退后，我们把轴放进车床。尼克安装了一个千分表，一个圆形小量规，一侧伸出一根销子，量规上有一根指针。如果你把销子推下去，指针就会移动，告诉你销子被推入了多远。尼克把销子抵在轴的焊接端，就像他把切削工具抵在钢片上一样。
After the steaming died down we put the shaft in the lathe. Nick set up a dial indicator, a little round gauge with a pin coming out of one side and a needle on the gauge. If you push the pin in, the needle moves around and tells you how far the pin is pushed in. Nick put the pin against the welded end of the shaft just as he'd put the cutting tool against the piece of steel.
“船长，该评估一下损失了，”他一边说，一边转动了轴。指针往上调，调到表盘上的千分之十五，然后又调回零，然后又调到千分之十五，又调回零，他转动了轴。“还好，”他说。“现在该做哈马了。”
"Time to assess the damage, Cap'n," he said, as he turned the shaft around. The needle went way up, to fifteen thousandths on the dial, then back to zero, and then up to fifteen thousandths and back to zero as he turned the shaft around. "Not too bad," he said. "Now for the hammah."
“你准备做什么？”我问。
"What are you going to do?" I asked.
“轻敲一下它，它就会恢复直立。”
"Give it a tap to make it straight again."
他转动轴，使高点位于千分表销上，将千分表移开，用塑料头木槌快速、猛烈地敲击轴端。他再次设置指示器，高点降至千分之四点五。
He turned the shaft so the high spot was at the dial indicator pin, moved the dial indicator away, and gave the end of the shaft a quick, sharp tap with the plastic-headed mallet. He set up the indicator again and the high spot was down to four and a half thousandths.
“我觉得我们最好趁势收手，船长，”他说。“这家伙够正直的，还能再干二十年。”
"I think we bettah quit while we're ahead, Cap'n," he said. "This guy's straight enough and he'll last another twenty years."
“好的，尼克。谢谢。”
"OK, Nick. Thanks."
那天晚上室外温度低于零度，钥匙插不进我的氪石自行车锁。锁里的金属缩水了——缩水不多，可能只有千分之一英寸或两英寸，但足以让又大又热的钥匙插不进去。
That night the temperature outside was below zero and the key wouldn't go into my Kryptonite bicycle lock. The metal in the lock had shrunk-not much, maybe a thousandth of an inch or two, but enough to prevent the big, warm key from fitting.
在咖啡店我要了一杯热水、一个塑料袋和一根橡皮筋。
At the coffee shop I asked for a cup of hot water, a plastic bag, and a rubber band.
我用塑料袋包住锁，用橡皮筋绑紧，慢慢地将热水倒在塑料袋上。然后我迅速取下塑料袋，将钥匙插入锁孔，打开自行车，骑车回家睡觉。
I wrapped the plastic bag around the lock, secured it with the rubber band, and slowly poured the hot water over the plastic. Then I quickly removed the plastic, put the key into the lock, unlocked the bike, and rode home to bed.
麻省理工学院的座右铭是“Mens et Manus”——“思想与双手”。
The MIT motto is "Mens et Manus"-"Mind and Hand."
章节
C H A P T E R
8
8
督工
The Taskmasters
法老吩咐督工说，你们不可再把稻草给百姓做砖。……要加重工夫，叫他们劳碌，不可在意虚妄的话……
And Pharoah commanded the taskmasters, saying ye shall no more give the people straw to make brick. ... Let there more work be laid upon the men, that they may labor therein; and let them not regard vain words....
出埃及记 5:6-9
EXODUS 5:6-9
日程：
Schedule:
1982 年春季：2.651 内燃机 (Heywood)
Spring '82: 2.651 The Internal Combustion Engine (Heywood)
2.999 独立学习（格林）
2.999 Independent Study (Greene)
2.996 论文
2.996 Thesis
1982 年 2 月 15 日
February 15, 1982
能源实验室会议室位于阿默斯特街四楼，斯隆学院对面。变阻器控制的灯光全亮，而研究的赞助者则享用麻省理工学院餐饮服务所能提供的最好的糕点。甚至咖啡也很好喝。
The Energy Laboratory conference room is inside the fourth floor on Amherst Street across from the Sloan School. The rheostatcontrolled lights were at full brightness while the Sponsors of the Research ate their choice of the best pastries MIT's catering service could muster. Even the coffee was good.
现在是争取赞助商的时候了。澳大利亚人菲利普·休斯 (Philip Hughes) 是卡特彼勒 (Caterpillar) 的发动机研究主管。来自印度的夏尔马 (Sharma) 于 20 世纪 60 年代初发表了一篇开创性的关于柴油燃烧理论的论文，并领导了约翰迪尔 (John Deere) 的发动机研究。艾伯特·李 (Albert Lee) 正在康明斯发动机公司 (Cummins Engine Company) 步步高升——他是在我之前最后一位从事 RCM 工作的人。我当年的办公室同事之一是让·奎斯托瓦 (Jean Questois)，他是雷诺巴黎办事处的一颗冉冉升起的新星。他们是最名副其实的工程师。
It was sponsor-stroking time. Philip Hughes, an Australian, was director of engine research for Caterpillar. Sharma, originally from India, had published a path-finding paper on the theory of diesel combustion in the early 1960s and headed up engine research at John Deere. Albert Lee was working his way up the ladder at Cummins Engine Company-he was the last person to work on the RCM before me. And one of my office mates for the year was Jean Questois, a rising star from the Paris office of Renault. They were engineers in the most literal sense of the word.
这里没有细条纹；棕色和浅蓝色是首选的服装颜色。
No pinstripes here; brown and light blue were the clothing colors of choice.
斯隆团队的成员更多。队长是约翰·B·海伍德教授，他是斯隆实验室主任，毕业于剑桥大学，获得荣誉学位。韦斯特是副队长；另一位是叶哲。叶哲是一名新任助理教授，他的博士学位来自麻省理工学院航空工程系，他的学士学位来自世界上唯一一所比麻省理工学院加州理工学院更好的学院。
Team Sloan had more members. The captain was Professor John B. Heywood, director of the Sloan Lab, graduate of University of Cambridge, recipient of honorary degrees. West was one lieutenant; the other was Chet Yeung. Chet was a new assistant professor, whose Ph.D. was from the Aeronautical Engineering department at MIT and whose bachelor's degree was from the one institute in the world that is better than MIT-Cal Tech.
我是个讨厌鬼，史努比驾驶着索普威斯骆驼式战斗机飞过第一次世界大战的战壕步兵时，他这样称呼他们。我的新实验室搭档斯科特·罗杰斯也是个讨厌鬼。斯科特负责大部分计算机工作，我负责大部分实验工作。第三个讨厌鬼是本·拉多夫斯基，他在隔壁的牢房里研究方形活塞发动机。我们的任务——我们别无选择，只能接受——是让那些身穿浅蓝和棕色制服的人相信他们的钱花得值。
I was a blighter, as Snoopy called the World War I trench footsoldiers as he flew over them in his Sopwith Camel. So was Scott Rogers, my new lab partner. Scott would do the bulk of the computer work, I the bulk of the experimental work. The third blighter was Ben Radovsky, who worked on the square piston engine in the cell next door. Our mission-and we had no choice but to accept it-was to convince the men in light blue and brown that their money was well spent.
9 点钟，海伍德教授准时宣布会议开始。“感谢大家今天前来。我们的学生在过去一个半月里一直非常努力，我想你们一定会对他们迄今取得的进步感到满意。”他的英国口音让他听起来比实际更聪明。我想像他一样，掌控局面。
Professor Heywood brought the meeting to order promptly at 9:00. "I'd like to thank you all for coming here today. Our students have been working very hard during the past month and a half, and I think you'll be pleased with the progress that they've made to date." His British accent made him sound even smarter than he was. I wanted to be like him, to command the situation.
他说：“我们将以佩珀·怀特的演讲开始会议，介绍快速压缩机实验计划在机械方面的进展。”
"We'll start the meeting with a presentation by Pepper White, on the progress on the mechanical aspects of the rapid compression machine experimental programme," he said.
我的膝盖在发抖。经历过几次这样的面试后，我想，任何面试都应该是小菜一碟。
My knees were shaking. After I've been through a few meetings like this, I thought, any job interview should be a piece of cake.
海伍德教授继续说道：“然后斯科特·罗杰斯和杨彻将讨论我们将要开发的柴油燃烧计算机模型的一些想法。午餐后，我们将听取本·拉多夫斯基的发言，然后参观实验室。不过，在佩珀开始之前，我想提醒大家，我们希望扩大联盟计划，纳入更多赞助商，如果您知道其他发动机公司或石油公司的同事可能有兴趣参与该计划，我们将非常感激您让我们与他们取得联系。”
Professor Heywood continued smoothly, "Then Scott Rogers and Chet Yeung will discuss some thoughts on the computer model of diesel combustion we'll be developing. After lunch, we'll hear from Ben Radovsky and then take a tour of the lab. Before Pepper starts, though, I'd like to remind you all that we hope to expand the consortium programme to include more sponsors, and if you know of colleagues at other engine companies or oil companies who might be interested in participating in the programme, we'd be most appreciative of your putting us into contact with them."
我把一叠透明胶片放在投影仪旁边，上面用类似吉夫托普罗斯使用的纸板做边框，然后打开投影仪，等他讲完。我站在屏幕旁边，直到提示我讲完为止。
I put the stack of transparencies with the cardboard frames like the ones Gyftopoulos used next to the overhead projector and turned the projector on while he finished. I stood next to the screen until my cue came.
本把灯光调暗了。会议桌周围的所有人的脸都被屏幕的灯光照亮了；只有脸在房间黑暗的背景下显露出来，就像在剧院里一样。眼睛专注、聪明、善良、正派，因为工程学中没有谎言的余地。在科学中，你可以撒谎和伪造数据，因为你不需要让任何东西发挥作用。在工程学中，产品就是你诚实的证明。
Ben dimmed the lights. All the faces around the conference table were lit up by the light of the screen; only the faces showed against the darkened background of the room, as in a theater. The eyes were focused, intelligent, good, and decent, since there is no room for lies in engineering. In science you can lie and fudge the data because you don't have to make anything work. In engineering the product is the proof of your honesty.
第一张幻灯片。“我想谈谈我们的总体目标、具体的短期目标、过去几周我们完成的一些事情以及未来几个月的计划。”
First slide. "I'd like to talk about our general objectives, our specific short-term objectives, some of the things we've accomplished in the past several weeks, and the schedule for the coming months."
当观众面带微笑并认真聆听时，我的膝盖开始不那么颤抖了。我使用的语言是正确的。
My knees started to shake less as the audience smiled and listened attentively. I was using the right lingo.
“首先是总体目标：我们希望让机器启动并运行，并确定我们可以进行实验的范围。这意味着我们需要确定我们可以从机器中获得的最大压力和温度，以及我们可以获得多高的涡流率（有无燃烧）。”
"First the general objective: We'd like to get the machine up and running and determine the range over which we can conduct our experiments. That means we need to determine the maximum pressure and temperature we can obtain from the machine, and also how high a swirl rate we can obtain, with and without combustion."
下一张幻灯片是机器的示意图。如您所见，机器有三个腔室。前面当然是燃烧室；后面是驱动空气室，与压缩空气储罐相连；轴的后面是缓冲室，里面装有传动液和不同内径的环。缓冲室中的活塞在压缩冲程期间减慢轴的运动。通过改变环的顺序，我们可以使轴和活塞的运动模拟实际柴油机的运动。当轴完全向前移动时，止回棘爪会将其锁定在原位。因此，我们能够观察在恒定体积下发生的燃烧。” 明亮的脸庞仍然面带微笑。在过去的六个星期里，我学到了很多单词。
Next slide-diagram of machine. As you can see, the machine has three chambers. The front is, of course, the combustion chamber; behind it is the driving air chamber, connected to a compressed air storage tank; farther back on the shaft is the snubbing chamber, filled with transmission fluid and rings of varying inner diameters. The piston in the snubbing chamber slows the shaft motion down during the compression stroke. By varying the order of the rings, we can make the motion of the shaft and piston simulate that of an actual diesel. The nonreturn pawls will lock the shaft in place when it has moved fully forward. We thus have the ability to look at combustion occurring at constant volume." The bright faces were still smiling. I'd learned a lot of words in the past six weeks.
我继续告诉他们拆开机器又重新组装起来的过程，和尼克一起修理轴的过程，测量和绘制带有新的青铜-特氟隆一体式活塞环的新活塞的过程，加工过程以及感觉它适合轴的过程。还有整台机器第一次不成功的测试。
I went on to tell them about taking the machine apart and putting it back together, about fixing the shaft with Nick, about measuring and drawing a new piston with new bronze-Teflon onepiece piston rings, about having it machined and feeling it fit into the shaft. About the first unsuccessful test of the whole machine.
演讲结束时，现场响起了热烈的掌声。在走向咖啡和丹麦卷桌的路上，韦斯特说：“太棒了。”我想，也许我并不是那么笨。也许我只是在第一学期不了解这个制度，这个制度鼓励你放弃任何低于平均水平的课程。
At the end there was a warm round of applause, and on the way to the coffee and Danish table, West said, "First class." Maybe I'm not such a dummy after all, I thought. Maybe I just didn't know the system during the first term, the system that encourages dropping any course in which you're below average.
午休前，夏尔马要求我们每月汇报进度。哦不，又有工作要做了，我心想。显然海伍德教授也是这么想的。
Before the lunch break, Sharma asked for monthly progress reports from us. Oh no, more work, I thought. Evidently so did Professor Heywood.
他说：“他们都是聪明的年轻人，但是有很多事情需要他们花费时间，这可能会阻碍他们的研究进展。”
"They're bright young people, but there are many demands on their time and it might impede their progress on the research," he said.
“你的意思是说，你为我们培养的人无法每月写一段简短的文字，说明他们取得了哪些成就以及他们要去哪里？”夏尔马反驳道。
"Do you mean to tell us that the people you're producing for us won't be able to write a brief paragraph once a month saying what they've accomplished and where they're headed?" Sharma retorted.
海伍德教授毫不退缩地回避了这个问题。他仍然掌控着局面，典型的资助者。“也许报告可以每两个月准备一次，”他说。他知道他必须审阅这些报告，他的秘书必须打印这些报告，他可能必须与整个小组会面，只是为了讨论这个主题。这很容易浪费掉一个上午的时间，而这些时间本可以用来写书。
Professor Heywood hedged without flinching. He was still in control, the quintessential grantsman. "Perhaps the reports could be prepared every two months," he said. He knew that he would have to review them, that his secretary would have to type them, that he might have to meet with the whole group just to discuss that one subject. It could easily kill a morning that would be better spent writing his book.
“每两个月一次对我来说没问题，”夏尔马说，其他人也同意。
"Every two months would be fine with me," Sharma said, and the others agreed.
2 月 17 日
February 17
艾伦·格林教授的办公室在 7 号楼二楼，可以俯瞰马萨诸塞大道和街对面的学生中心。在 10 月初他的能源工程讲座之后，我们进行了交谈，之后他同意在 1 月份接受我作为独立研究学生。我记得《纸上谈兵》中的那件事，当时哈特很荣幸被金菲尔德邀请帮助他准备一篇学术论文；我想这可能差不多。
Professor Allen Greene's office was in Building 7, on the second floor overlooking Mass. Ave. and the student center across the street. Following up on our conversation after his Energy Engineering lecture in early October, he'd agreed to take me on as an independent study student in January. I remembered the incident in The Paper Chase when Hart was honored to be asked by Kingfield to help him prepare a scholarly article; I thought this might be close to equivalent.
格林管理着应用系统工程研究所（IASE），这是工程专业的中期职业再培训基地，其成立旨在模仿哈佛商学院和肯尼迪政府学院为其各自的行业所做的工作。
Greene ran the Institute for Applied Systems Engineering (IASE), a midcareer retraining ground for the engineering profes sion founded to do what Harvard Business School and the Kennedy School of Government do for their respective trades.
IASE 是麻省理工学院与业界保持密切联系的机制之一。中高级工程师或研发经理来到麻省理工学院，上几节课，也许做一个小项目，结识很多教授，然后聘请他们遇到的教授作为顾问，找出如何解决他们的问题。
IASE is one of the mechanisms by which MIT maintains its close links to industry. Mid- to upper-level engineers or research and development managers come to MIT, take a few classes, maybe do a small project, meet a lot of professors, and later hire the professors they meet as consultants to figure out how to solve their problems.
和我一样，格林也是局外人。IASE 是他的领地，远离主流院系，远离传统的终身教职轨道。他的博士学位来自伊利诺伊大学，他在联合碳化物公司、世界银行（技术开发总监）和俄亥俄州立大学（工程学院院长）的职位与麻省理工学院教授的目标（获得终身教职并创办一家价值数百万美元的公司）并不相称。不过，对我来说，他已经足够好了。
Like me, Greene was an outsider. The IASE was his fiefdom, apart from the mainstream departments, apart from the traditional tenure track. His Ph.D. was from the University of Illinois, and his positions at Union Carbide, the World Bank (director of technology development), and Ohio State (dean of engineering) did not quite measure up to the MIT professor goal-getting tenure and starting a multimillion-dollar company. He was good enough for me, though.
当我走进他办公室的前厅时，他的秘书正在打印一些蓝色的卡片，上面写着他的约会和要做的事情。要想取得超乎寻常的成就，你必须有超乎寻常的组织能力。
When I entered the antechamber of his office, his secretary was typing little blue index cards with his appointments and things-to-do on it. To hyperachieve you have to be hyperorganized.
当她第一次尝试给他打电话时，他的电话正忙，但在她告诉我催眠如何帮助她戒烟几分钟后，他给她打电话让我进去。
His phone was busy when she first tried to buzz him, but after a few minutes of her telling me how hypnosis was helping her quit smoking, he buzzed her to send me in.
下午四点，西边的阳光照耀着他的办公室，阳光明媚得让他不得不关掉办公桌上方的日光灯。他的办公室看起来就像吉夫托普罗斯的办公室，但面积更大，除了桌子、椅子、书架和黑板外，还有两张 L 形沙发围绕着一张咖啡桌。
At four in the afternoon his office was bright with the western sun, bright enough that he'd turned off the fluorescents above his desk. His office was corporate-looking, like Gyftopoulos's, only bigger, with two couches in an L around a coffee table in addition to the desk, chairs, bookcases, and blackboard.
他握着我的手说：“抱歉让您久等了，刚才打电话的是福特总裁，我不想打断他。来，请坐。”他坐在一张沙发上，我坐在另一张沙发上。“你这边怎么样？”
He shook my hand and said, "Sorry to keep you waiting; that was the president of Ford on the phone and I don't like to cut him off. Here, have a seat." He sat on one couch, I on the other. "How are things going for you here?"
我没有告诉他我处于试用期。“哦，我觉得还不错。我在斯隆汽车实验室做柴油燃烧实验。海伍德教授负责这项工作，今年春天我还要上他的发动机课，还要和你一起自学。”
I didn't tell him about being on probation. "Oh, pretty good, I guess. I'm doing experimental work in diesel combustion at the Sloan auto lab. Professor Heywood heads that up, and I'm also taking his engine class this spring, plus the independent study with you."
“约翰·海伍德非常优秀，”他说，“你的实验工作将帮助你了解什么是可能的和现实的，即使它有点偏向研究。我们可以尝试用一些现实世界的设计问题来平衡这一点。我希望你能为我的书编写一个计算机示例作为你的主要项目，但首先我们要花几周时间来回顾一下我多年来开发的一些解决问题的技巧。”
"John Heywood is very good," he said. "And your experimental work will help you understand what's possible and realistic, even if it's a little on the researchy side. We can try to balance that with some real-world design problems. I'd like you to work up a computer example for my book as your major project, but first we'll take a few weeks to go over some problem-solving techniques I've developed over the years."
他以尊重的态度和我交谈，就像对待一个近乎同辈的人，或者至少是未来的同辈一样。这让人耳目一新。我不知道他是不是个好人，或者我是不是在进步。他打开咖啡桌上的马尼拉文件夹，说：“我们到黑板前……”
He talked to me with respect, as a near-peer or at least a future peer. It was refreshing. I wondered whether he was a nice guy or if I was improving. He opened up the manila folder on the coffee table and said, "Let's go up to the blackboard and ..."
哦不。不要再这样了。
Oh, no. Not this again.
我会举个例子来告诉你如何解决蒸汽循环问题。”他在黑板上画了一个网格和一个蒸汽动力厂的图表——一个锅炉，其中的水由火焰或核反应堆加热；一个涡轮机，由锅炉产生的高压蒸汽迫使旋转；一个冷凝器将低压蒸汽转化回水；还有一个泵把水推入锅炉。这就是世界经济的动力来源——任何使用电的东西实际上都是小火。他在图表中的各个点上做了小标记并给它们编号。
.. I'll work an example to show you how to solve steam cycle problems." He drew a grid on the blackboard and a diagram of a steam power plant-a boiler where the water is heated by the flame or by the nuclear reactor; a turbine that is forced to spin by the high-pressure steam generated by the boiler; a condenser to turn the low-pressure steam back to water; and a pump to push the water into the boiler. This is how the world economy is powered-anything that uses electricity is effectively a little fire. He put little hash marks at various points in the diagram and numbered them.
“你要做的是从循环中的某个点开始，然后逐步推进。对于循环中的每个点，你在表中画一条线。表中的每一列都是一个变量，如压力、温度、能量、熵。在任何设计问题中，你都会受到某些约束，你的工作就是设计出一个满足这些约束的可行解决方案，”他说。
"What you want to do is start at one point in the cycle and work your way around. For each point in the cycle, you put a line in the table. Each column in the table is a variable, like pressure, temperature, energy, entropy. In any design problem you'll be given certain constraints and your job will be to devise a workable solution that satisfies the constraints," he said.
我们两人填写了该周期的已知量表，将未知量留空。这种方法井然有序、有条不紊、简单易行。
The two of us filled in the table of known quantities for the cycle, leaving blanks for the unknowns. The approach was orderly, methodical, simple.
这个课程是牛津剑桥意义上的辅导课：牛津和剑桥没有课程，而是学生定期与导师见面。我希望麻省理工学院能鼓励更多这样的课程，但这对教授来说非常耗时，如果他把时间花在教学和解释上，就没有时间做真正的工作，比如筹集研究资金、咨询、出版和发表论文、为自己树立名声。此外，如果你不能自己搞清楚所有事情，你可能不适合麻省理工学院。他们想知道为什么学生会自杀。
The session was a tutorial in the Oxbridge sense: at Oxford and Cambridge there are no classes; instead students meet regularly with tutors. I wished MIT encouraged more of this, but it's very time-consuming for the professor, and if he spends his time teaching and explaining things, there won't be time for the real work of bringing in research funds, consulting, publishing and delivering papers, making a name for oneself. Besides, if you can't figure out everything by yourself, you probably don't belong at MIT. And they wonder why students kill themselves.
格林说：“从现在到我们下节课之前完成这道题对你来说是个很好的练习。先手工算一下，然后我们再考虑把它放到电脑上。我还有另一道题要给你，气球充气问题。我想让你算出，如果用一个大的恒压空气罐给气球充气，气球的体积会如何随时间变化。第三项，试着想出一些由于熵高而无用的能量的例子或类比。你可以和我的秘书约好十天到两周后我们下节课的时间。”
Greene said, "It'd be a good exercise for you to finish this between now and our next session. First do it by hand and then we'll see about putting it on the computer. I've also got another problem for you, the balloon-filling problem. I want you to figure out how the volume for a balloon will vary as a function of time if you fill it with a large constant-pressure tank of air. And as a third item, try to come up with some examples or analogies for energy that isn't useful because of high entropy. You can make an appointment with my secretary for ten days to two weeks from now for our next session."
我选了两周。我可能每天都需要。
I picked two weeks. I might need every day.
2 月 19 日
February 19
蒸汽循环很简单。气球则是另一回事。它是热力学和流体力学的结合，还有最令人害怕的东西，即“可变形控制体积”。通常体积是固定的，处于稳定状态，即事物不会随时间而变化。一根直径为 3 英寸的管道通常直径为 3 英寸，您可以在其周围画一个假想的盒子，并通过调用适当的守恒方程来计算质量、能量（无论它是什么）和熵（实际上无论它是什么）。或者正如哈佛大学的人所说，所有的 gazintas 都会变成 gazatta。所有进去的东西都必须出来。
The steam cycle was easy. The balloon was a different story. It was a combination of thermodynamics and fluid mechanics, with that most dreaded of all things, a "deformable control volume." Usually volumes are fixed, and at steady state-i.e., things don't vary with time. A 3-inch-diameter pipe will typically stay 3 inches in diameter, and you can draw an imaginary box around it and account for mass, energy (whatever that is), and entropy (really whatever that is) by invoking the appropriate conservation equations. Or as they say at Harvard, all the gazintas gots to gazatta. Everything that goes in has to come out.
但如果气球中充满了来自大罐的空气，且压力恒定，那么情况就不一样了。气球的体积总是在变化，直到气球中的压力等于罐中的压力，或者直到气球爆裂。这是高级课程。我开始尝试寻找解决方案。
Not so in the case of a balloon filling with air from a large tank at constant pressure. There the volume is always changing, until the pressure in the balloon is equal to the pressure in the tank, or until the balloon pops. This is the advanced course. I began my attempt at a solution.
步骤 1. 定义问题：画图。思考问题涉及的物理内容。他只是口头陈述，但我需要用符号来表达。
Step 1. Define problem: Draw picture. Think about what the problem involves physically. He just stated it verbally but I need to say it with symbols.
假设压力比大气压高出 3 磅/平方英寸。在他的问题陈述中寻找关键词。大是指储罐，这意味着它不受气球发生的情况的影响 - 即，假想的储罐以恒定的速率不断抽出空气并且永远不会排空。现在想想会发生什么。气球将充满气，直到其内部压力等于大储罐中的压力。这些是初始状态和最终状态。气球将伸展，能量将以气压和橡胶张力的形式存储在气球中。
Assume a pressure, say 3 pounds per square inch above atmospheric pressure. Look for key words in his problem statement. Large referring to the tank means that it's not affected by what happens to the balloon-i.e., the imaginary tank keeps pumping air out at a constant rate and never empties. Now think about what will happen. The balloon will fill up until the pressure inside it equals the pressure in the large tank. Those are initial and final states. The balloon is going to stretch, and energy will be stored in the balloon both in the air pressure and in the tension of the rubber.
步骤 2. 前往 Barker 工程图书馆，浏览每本热力学书籍，看看这个例子是否以前已经以印刷形式解决过。请注意，所有热力学书籍的目录几乎相同。无法找到气球填充问题的解法。暂时停止研究这个问题。
Step 2. Go to Barker Engineering Library and look through every book on thermodynamics to see whether the example has been worked out in print before. Notice that tables of contents are almost identical for all the thermo books. Fail to find worked-out solution of balloon-filling problem. Quit working on the problem for the time being.
一周后
One week later
早上 7:00 刮胡子。刷牙。漱口。吐掉。步骤 3。灵感闪现。在纸巾上重新画图……
7:00 A.M. Shave. Brush teeth. Rinse. Spit. Step 3. Flash of inspiration. Redraw picture on paper towel ...
旧图非常复杂，因为气球膨胀的几何形状是三维的，而我不是数学家，我是工程师。如果我转换到新图，我可以清楚地看到气球的弹性集中在一个可以膨胀和收缩的弹簧中，我可以看到膨胀的体积方面是一个可移动的气球皮壁，质量很小，只朝一个方向移动。如果简化方法的方程与真实气球的方程相似，我可以用我的简化的一维方程预测真实气球的行为。这就是他们所说的模型。
The old picture is intractably complex because the geometry of the balloon's expanding is three-dimensional and I'm not a mathematician, I'm an engineer. If I convert to the new picture, I can clearly see the stretchiness of the balloon lumped into a spring that can expand and contract, and I can see the expanded volume aspect as a movable balloon skin wall with very little mass, moving in only one direction. If the equations for the simplified approach are similar to the equations for the real balloon, I can predict the behavior of the real balloon with my simplified, one-dimensional equations. This is what they mean by a model.
步骤4.重新绘制新图，显示气球皮的运动。
Step 4. Redraw new picture, showing the motion of the balloon skin.
当空气从罐子进入气球时，气球外皮会移动（A2），弹簧会拉伸。现在回想一下这个问题。找出气球体积随时间的变化。假想的一维圆柱形气球的体积就是其长度乘以其圆形可移动外皮的恒定面积。问题归结为找出气球长度随时间的变化。我正在取得进展。
As air enters the balloon from the tank, the balloon skin moves (A2) and the spring stretches. Now to remember the problem. Find how the balloon volume varies with time. The volume of the imaginary, one-dimensional cylindrical balloon is just its length times the constant area of its circular movable skin. The problem reduces to finding how the balloon length varies with time. I'm making progress.
2 月 27 日
February 27
海伍德教授的内燃机课在 38 号楼三楼，在另一个装有调光器的室内房间里。
Professor Heywood's Internal Combustion Engine class was on the third floor of Building 38, in another interior room with dimmers.
海伍德喜欢用讲义和幻灯片的方式讲课。他会分发屏幕上的内容，然后指着图表，用不同颜色的笔在幻灯片上做笔记。这对他和我们来说都很有效率。我们不会浪费时间去重绘对他来说更容易复印的内容，海伍德教授的米色灯芯绒夹克上也不会沾上粉笔灰。
Heywood favored the handouts and slides approach to lecturing. He distributed copies of what would be on the screen and pointed to the diagram and made notes on the transparencies with different colored pens. This was efficient both for him and for us. We would not waste time trying to redraw what would be easier for him to photocopy, and Professor Heywood would not get chalk dust on his beige corduroy jacket.
海伍德身材苗条，看上去比实际年龄年轻 45 岁。也许每天骑自行车往返于牛顿的家对他有帮助。他是众多骑自行车上班的机械工程教授之一，尽管他的工作由石油和汽车公司资助——他重视效率。
Heywood was trim and looked younger than his forty-five years. Maybe the bicycle ride to and from his house in Newton every day helped. He was one of the many mechanical engineering professors who cycled to work even though funded by oil and car companies-he valued efficiency.
他很早就获得了终身教职，虽然比大多数教员都聪明，但他没有创办过公司。他更喜欢写书，在需要时提供咨询，成为一名杰出的学者。有一天，我看到他一边吃午餐，一边望着基里安庭院的树木，也许在想麻省理工学院的环境不如剑桥或伦敦帝国理工学院那么舒适，但这里的工资和税收更好，而且美国的汽车工业还没有消亡。也许有一天，斯隆实验室会变成海伍德实验室，而 labbratory 会按照英国的方式发音。
He'd received tenure young, and although smarter than most of the faculty, he hadn't started a company. He preferred to write his book, to consult when asked to, to be a distinguished scholar. One day I saw him eating his lunch and looking out onto the trees of Killian Court, perhaps thinking about how MIT wasn't quite as pleasant an environment as Cambridge or London's Imperial College, but the pay and the taxes were better here, and America's auto industry wasn't dead yet. Perhaps one day the Sloan Lab would be the Heywood Laboratory, and labbratory would be pronounced the British way.
当天的讲座是关于容积效率，也就是你可以往罐子里塞入多少空气。如果罐子的底部可以上下移动，你就有了一个类似内燃机的心脏，也就是气缸。如果你能想办法往罐子里塞入更多的空气，你就可以往里面注入更多的燃料，然后用更多的空气来燃烧更多的燃料。这有点像吹气球。
The day's lecture concerned volumetric efficiency, or how much air you can push into a can. If the bottom of the can moves up and down, you have something like the heart of an internal combustion engine, a.k.a. the cylinder. If you can figure out how to push more air into the can, you can put more fuel in and then use the more air to burn the more fuel. It's sort of like blowing up a balloon.
讲座最后，Heywood教授提到，随着海拔升高、空气变稀薄，发动机的容积效率会明显下降。
Toward the end of the lecture, Professor Heywood mentioned that the volumetric efficiency of an engine decreases markedly as elevation above sea level increases and air becomes thinner.
坐在我旁边前排正中央右侧的一位同学举起了手，海伍德教授认出了他。“是的，阿里。”
The fellow sitting next to me in the front row just right of center raised his hand and was recognized by Professor Heywood. "Yes, Ari."
“教授，您说得对。这种现象对我驻扎在戈兰高地的坦克营来说是个大问题。幸运的是，这对俄制叙利亚坦克来说也是一个问题。”
"You are absolutely right, Professor. Thees phenomenon was a great problem for my tank batallion on the Golan Heights. Fortunately, it was also a problem for the Russian-made Syrian tanks."
“谢谢你提到这一点，”海伍德教授说。“这是一个很好的例子，说明容积效率是多么重要。”
"Thank you for mentioning that," Professor Heywood said. "That's a good example of how important an issue volumetric efficiency is."
海伍德教授讲完课后，我向安做了自我介绍。他看上去三十多岁或四十出头，头发分叉，已经花白且稀疏了许多。他戴着眼镜，穿着格子衬衫和牛仔裤，有点大肚子。
Professor Heywood finished his lecture and I introduced myself to An. He looked as if he was in his late thirties or early forties and his hair, parted on the side, was graying and thinning a lot. He wore glasses, a plaid shirt, and jeans and had a bit of a paunch.
“你好，佩珀·怀特先生，”他说。“你愿意和我一起去学生中心喝杯咖啡吗？”
"How do you do, Meestair Pepper White," he said. "Would you like to join me for a cup of coffee at the student center?"
“当然了，”我说。我们边走边聊，他向我讲述了一些他的背景。他目前是以色列军队的少校，父母是二战刚结束后的罗马尼亚大屠杀幸存者，从以色列建国之初就在以色列长大。他毕业于海法理工学院，获得机械工程和工业管理学位，目前正在休假三年，去麻省理工学院攻读博士学位。一位将军就是这样做的，而这个学位帮助这位将军从少校晋升到上校。阿里希望他也能如此。
"Sure," I said. As we walked and talked he told me a bit about his background. Presently a major in the Israeli army, he'd been born to Romanian Holocaust survivors just after World War II and then raised in Israel from the birth of the nation. He had graduated from the Technion in Haifa with degrees in both mechanical engineering and industrial management and was on the second of three years of leave from the army to get a Ph.D. at MIT. A general had done precisely that, and the degree to end all degrees had helped that general advance from major and colonel. Ari hoped the same would happen for him.
喝完咖啡后，阿里说：“来吧，我的朋友。我想给你看隔壁房间里的东西。”我们走进电子游戏室，里面一般都是极客中的极客，长满痘痘、长相丑陋的麻省理工学院书呆子的典型代表。他们没有想过如何生活，也没有想过如何约会，而是把闲暇时间花在盯着阴极射线管，快速地按着屏幕下方的按钮。如果我觉得自己丑、胖或者肤色不好，我就会去电子游戏室，出来后就觉得自己已经准备好从事模特职业了。
After coffee, Ari said, "Come, my friend. I want to show you something in the room next door here." We entered the video game room, in general occupied by the geekiest of the geeks, the ugliest acne-ridden prototypes of what people expect of MIT nerds. Instead of thinking about how to have a life, how to maybe go out on a date, they while away their leisure minutes looking at a cathode ray tube and make rapid gestures with the buttons below the screen. If I ever felt ugly or fat or like I had a bad complexion, I'd go to the video game room and come out feeling ready for a modeling career.
（一些视频极客在游戏方面有很大优势；他们知道黑客在哪里。黑客是设计机器的程序员编写的技巧，这样他就可以永远在酒吧玩游戏。由于一半的视频游戏程序员来自麻省理工学院，而麻省理工学院的许多程序员在高中或暑期工作期间为视频游戏开发商工作，因此存在大量内部视频黑客交易。这对控制视频游戏行业的人来说是一个持续的烦恼。
(Some of the video geeks had a major advantage on the games; they knew where the hacks were. A hack is a trick encoded by the programmer who designs the machine so that he can play the game forever at whatever bar he happens to be in. Since half the people who program the video games are from MIT, and many of the programmers from MIT worked for video game developers during high school or during their summer jobs, there is a fair amount of insider video hack trading. It's a constant source of annoyance to the people who control the video game industry.
麻省理工学院的学生应该掌握一些这些机器，这才是公平的。第一个视频游戏 PONG，也就是我在霍普金斯大学一年级时用操纵杆来回移动的黑白小条，是由麻省理工学院数字电子实验室的两名学生作为一个学期项目发明的。）
It's only fair that there should be some mastery of these machines by MIT students. The first video game, PONG, the little black and white bars that I moved back and forth with a joystick when I was a freshman at Hopkins, was invented as a semester project by two students in course six one eleven, MIT's Digital Electronics lab.)
阿里在坦克指挥官屏幕下方的架子上放了一枚 25 美分硬币，确定了我们的排队位置。轮到我们时，他说：“你先走。我来付钱。”
Ari put a quarter on the ledge below the Tank Commander screen to establish our place in line. When our time came, he said, "You go first. I will pay."
“谢谢。你能简单介绍一下这个东西怎么操作吗？”
"Thanks. Could you give me a little briefing on how to work this thing?"
“当然。你需要一只手握住每个操纵杆。如果你想前进，就把两个操纵杆向前推，如果你想后退，就把两个操纵杆拉回来。每个操纵杆控制坦克的一个履带，就像在真正的坦克上一样。如果你想右转，就把左边的操纵杆向前推，把右边的操纵杆拉回来，如果你想左转，就反方向操作。当你对准目标时，按下操纵杆顶部的两个按钮。”
"Certainly. You need to put one hand on each joystick. If you want to go forward, you push both joysticks forward, and you pull both back if you want to go backward. Each joystick controls one of the treads of the tank, just like in a real tank. If you want to turn right, push the left one forward and pull the right one back, and you do it the other way to go left. When you've lined up on the target, press both buttons on top of the joysticks."
他把 25 美分硬币扔进去，我试了一下。看着坦克炮管上下移动，模拟坦克的噪音，与我躲避敌人火力和射击碉堡的方向相对应，这很有趣。阿里的指导帮助我“右转……后退……前进……左转……现在开火！”——我在三十秒内就摧毁了三个碉堡。几百枚 25 美分硬币之后，我就能熟练地做到这一点了。
He put the quarter in and I gave it a shot. It was fun to see the barrel of the tank move up and down with the simulated noise of the tank corresponding to whichever way I was turning to avoid the enemy fire and shoot on the pillboxes. Ari's coaching helped"Right ... back ... forward ... left ... now fire!"-and in my thirty seconds I knocked out three of the pillboxes. I could get good at this after a few hundred quarters.
然后轮到阿里了。他站得比我离机器远，弯下腰，使他的躯干几乎与机器平行。“这样我对机器的感觉更好，”他说。
Then it was Ari's turn. He stood farther from the machine than I did and bent over so his torso was almost horizontal. "I get a better feeling for the machine this way," he said.
砰砰砰，左-右-前-后——阿里是个高手。他快速、果断地猛拉操纵杆，发出咕噜声，仿佛他所有的紧张能量都转化为反射和快速反应。三分钟后，97 个碉堡终于击中了他。
Boom, pow, left- right- forward-back-Ari was a master. He jerked the joysticks quickly, decisively, grunting as if all his nervous energy were channeled into reflexes and fast response. Three minutes and 97 pillboxes later one finally got him.
“你一定经常玩这个游戏，”我说。
"You must play this a lot," I said.
“实际上不是这个，”他回答道。“我在六日战争和十月战争期间用真正的武器锻炼了我的能力。这个要容易得多，因为我玩的时候不担心自己的生命安全。我觉得这很放松。”
"Not this one, actually," he answered. "I developed my abilities with the real thing during the Six Day War and the October War. And this one is much easier because I am not afraid for my life when I play it. I find it very relaxing."
2 月 28 日
February 28
回到气球。步骤 5。参考步骤 4 中的图片。再次思考问题。回想一下 Mary 等人和 Bernoulli 一起上流体力学学习课时，他们透过 Arno 桥望向两块岩石。如果罐内压力不比大气压高很多，因此空气不可压缩，我可以称之为不可压缩流并使用 Bernoulli 方程。这将告诉我空气从罐内流入气球的速度有多快，这取决于罐内压力与气球内压力之比。
Back to the balloon. Step 5. Refer to picture from Step 4. Think about problem again. Remember fluid mechanics study session with Mary et al. and Bernoulli looking over the bridge on the Arno at the two rocks. If the pressure in the tank is not a whole lot higher than atmospheric pressure, and the air is therefore not compressible, I can call it incompressible flow and use Bernoulli's equation. That will tell me how fast the air will flow from the tank into the balloon, depending on how much pressure there is in the tank compared to how much is in the balloon.
我还可以说，进入气球的所有物质都会导致气球变大。这是另一个方程，称为质量连续性方程。
I can also say that everything that goes into the balloon results in enlargement of the balloon. That's another equation, called the continuity of mass equation.
最后，我可以平衡气球表面的力——气球的弹性必须由气球内外的气压来平衡。这给了我三个方程和五个未知数。
And finally, I can balance the forces on the skin of the balloon-the stretchiness of the balloon has to be balanced by the air pressure inside and outside the balloon. That gives me three equations and five unknowns.
现在我要做的就是展示 x 如何随时间变化，这样我就可以绘制气球的位置，格林会认为我是个英雄。
Now all I have to do is show how x varies with time, so I can graph the position of the balloon and Greene will think I'm a hero.
第 6 步。翻开霍普金斯大学二年级时读过的微分方程书。微分方程处理的是随时间移动的事物，例如发动机的活塞、地球和月球，或者正在膨胀的气球的外壳。
Step 6. Dust off differential equations book from sophomore year at Hopkins. A differential equation deals with things that move in time, like the piston of an engine, the earth, and the moonor the skin of a balloon being blown up.
微分方程书中的所有内容都涉及“线性”微分方程。这意味着第二项，即 x 点平方项，意味着我无法使用该书中的任何方法解决这个问题。我将速度乘以速度，这使其成为“非线性”。
Everything in the differential equations book deals with "linear" differential equations. That means that the second term, the x-dot-squared term, means I can't solve this using any methods in that book. I'm multiplying the velocity by the velocity, and that makes it "nonlinear."
步骤 7：放弃。当研究所或问题集让你陷入困境时，这就是你在麻省理工学院所做的。
Step 7: Punt. This is what you do at MIT when the institute or the problem set has painted you into a corner.
3 月 2 日
March 2
格林快速浏览了我的蒸汽系统解决方案，并用他的 Cross 笔勾选了步骤。然后他让我到黑板前展示我对气球问题的解决方案。
Greene looked quickly through my steam system solution, checking off the steps with his Cross pen. Then he asked me to go to the blackboard to present my solution to the balloon problem.
“这真是个好主意，”他谈到我让气球只朝一个方向膨胀时说道。“你知道，在我当经理的这些年里，我发现有些人富有创造力，能够发明东西，而有些人则能够分析富有创造力的人发明的东西。没有多少人能同时做到这两点，但这个解决方案让我知道你可能是其中之一。”
"Now that is a good idea," he said of my making the balloon expand in only one direction. "You know, in my years as a manager, I've found that there are people who are creative and can invent things and then there are people who can analyze things that the creative people have invented. Not many people can do both, but this solution shows me you might be one of them."
Kvel 市。这家伙一定会给我打 A。毕竟他们不能把我赶出去。
Kvel city. This guy's bound to give me an A. They won't be able to kick me out, after all.
我把步骤都讲解给他听，并向他展示了我那组无法解的方程。“这就是我的答案，”我说。“不幸的是，我不知道如何解它，无法绘制出气球表面位置随时间变化的图形。我想你可能会有一些建议。”
I went through the steps for him and showed him my insoluble set of equations. "This is my answer," I said. "Unfortunately, I don't know how to solve it, to be able to graph the position of the skin of the balloon as a function of time. I thought you might have some suggestions."
“好吧，如果你把这个问题带到联合碳化物公司找我，我会把应用数学部门的负责人请过来，让他的一个人在电脑上解决这个问题，”他说。“但你至少要知道足够的知识，以便与应用数学类型的人进行知识交流，并防止他们为这个项目花费太多时间。我们去走廊尽头的苹果电脑店，我会告诉你如何启动它。”
"Well, if you brought that problem to me at Union Carbide, I'd get the head of the applied mathematics department in here and one of his people would solve it on the computer," he said. "But you want to know at least enough to talk knowledgeably with the applied math types and prevent them from billing too many hours to the project. Let's go down the hall to the Apple and I'll show you how to boot it up."
计算机室是一间角落办公室，大小跟一个大衣柜差不多，两面墙上都有窗户，还有一张办公桌和一台苹果电脑。窗户外是七层高的庭院，由于房间在二楼，所以从未受到阳光直射，但柔和的散射光和窗外的树木让我感觉自己身处修道院的回廊中。
The computer room was a corner office the size of a large closet, with windows on both walls and a desk and the Apple. The windows looked out onto a seven-story courtyard; since the room was on the second floor it never received direct sunlight, but the soft diffuse light and the tree just outside the window made me feel I was in a cloister's cloister.
格林把软盘放进机器，打开开关。我猜他所说的“启动”就是这个意思。
Greene put a diskette into the machine and turned on the on switch. I presumed that's what he meant by "booting it up."
他说：“我只需编写一个三行程序，将两个数字相加，就可以向你展示如何开始。”
"I'll just write a three-line program that will add two numbers for you to show you how to get started," he said.
他的手指在键盘上飞舞，就像钢琴演奏家一样。与语音或手写不同，语音或手写对信息传输速度有自然限制，而计算机接收信息的速度几乎和他的思维一样快。他在高中的盲打课上一定表现不错。
His fingers blurred around the keyboard, like a concert pianist's. Unlike speech or writing by hand, which have natural speed limits on how fast information can be transfered, the computer could receive information almost as quickly as he thought. He must have done well in touch typing class in high school.
当他完成后，屏幕上显示“输入 A”，我输入了 3。它说“输入 B”，我输入了 5。它说“A + B = 8”。
When he was done, the screen said "Input A," and I typed 3. "Input B," it said, and I typed 5. "A + B = 8," it said.
“你以前编过程序，对吧？”他说。
"You've programmed before, haven't you?" he said.
“嗯，大学时只学过一点，但那都是在电传打字机上，用黄色纸张连接着走廊尽头空调房里的一台大电脑。这次看起来有点不同。”
"Well, just a little in college, but that was always on a teletype terminal with the yellow paper that was connected to a big computer in an air-conditioned room down the hall. This looks a little different."
“原理上是一样的，”他说，“抽屉里有一本编程手册，如果需要帮助，你可以参考一下。下次见面时，我希望你能够设置好你向我展示的方程，这样你就可以逐步调整时间增量，看看随着模型中的弹簧伸展和气球内压力上升，气球表面会发生什么变化。试着组织方程，使信息从一个方程流向下一个方程，这样在程序的每一步，计算机都有进入下一步所需的所有数据。哦，在编程指南中阅读“子程序”。你可以用它们将一个大而复杂的问题分解成几个小而简单的问题。这将使调试变得容易得多。现在，让我们回到我的办公室，回顾一下你想出的熵的例子。”
"It's the same in principle," he said. "There's a programming manual in the drawer here, so you can refer to that if you need help. What I want you to do for our next meeting is to set up the equations you showed me in such a way that you can step through little increments of time and see what happens to the skin of the balloon as the spring in your model stretches and the pressure in your balloon rises. Try to organize the equations so the information will flow from one equation to the next, so that at each step in the program, the computer has all the data it needs to go on to the next step. Oh, and read up on'subroutines' in the programming guide. You can use them to break up a big, complex problem into several smaller, simple problems. It'll make debugging much easier. For now, let's go back to my office and go over the examples of entropy you've come up with."
垃圾填埋场、暴饮暴食、吸烟、吸毒——过去两周里，现代生活的所有弊病都浮现在我的脑海中，但我知道他想要更具体的东西。
Landfills, overeating, smoking, drug addiction-all the ills of modern life had come to mind during the past two weeks, but I knew he'd want something more specific.
“嗯，前几天我在马萨诸塞大道的人行横道上看到有人试图在一个比汽车短 6 英寸的空间里平行停车。就整个街区而言，其他车辆之间的距离为 2 或 3 英尺，有时甚至达到 4 英尺。所以，如果你把这些小空间加起来，你可能能够轻松地将三四辆汽车塞进街区。但这些小空间本身是没用的。这是我能想到的最好的办法。”
"Well, the other day I was at the crosswalk at Mass. Ave. and I saw somebody trying to parallel park in a space that was about 6 inches too short for the car. For the length of the block there were 2 or 3 feet between the other cars, sometimes as much as 4 feet. So if you added up the little pieces of space you'd probably be able to fit three or four more cars into the block comfortably. But the little pieces of space by themselves were useless. That's the best I could come up with."
“这个很好，”他说，“你可以打个比方，空间相当于能量，空间的短小相当于熵。空间越长，它所代表的系统就越有序，就越有用。很好。我喜欢这个。我认为你正在取得进步。”
"That's a good one," he said. "You could make the analogy that space is the equivalent of energy, and the shortness of the space is the equivalent of entropy. The longer the space is, the more ordered a system it represents and the more useful it is. That's good. I like that. I think you're making progress."
章节
C H A P T E R
9
9
春天
Spring
3 月 15 日
March 15
三月十五日。第一天气温高于零度，是时候把脑子里的思绪驱散了。是时候骑自行车了。我的逃生路线是经过贝尔蒙特的特拉佩洛路。
The Ides of March. The first day above freezing, and time to blast the mental cobwebs out. Time to go on a bicycle ride. My escape route was out Trapelo Road through Belmont.
压力依然存在，但由于本学期只安排了两场考试，因此有更多的放松时间。爬上第一座大山，贝尔蒙特山，我记得我的老自行车教练告诉我要坐在马鞍上，用力向上骑行。他说，这样可以让我大腿前部的肌肉放松，让旧血液流出，新血液流入。如果我总是用力向前骑行，压力就会增加，我的腿就会感到疲劳，我就会从队伍中掉下来。
The pressure was still constant, but with only two exams scheduled for the term, there was more relaxing time. Up the first major hill, Belmont Hill, I remembered my old cycling coach's telling me to sit back in the saddle and pull on the upstroke. He said that would allow the muscles in the front of my legs to relax and let the used blood flow out and the new blood flow in. If I always pushed on the front of my legs the tension would build up and my legs would feel tired and I'd be dropped from the pack.
这有点像海伍德对内燃机的描述。燃料进入气缸，燃烧，然后排出并排出。如果你把排气管留在气缸里，就没有空间容纳新鲜的、未燃烧的燃料和空气，你的车就会熄火。
It was sort of like Heywood's description of an internal combustion engine. Fuel goes into the cylinder, gets burned, then pushed out and exhausted. If you kept the exhaust in the cylinder, there wouldn't be room for the fresh, unburned fuel and air, and your car would stall.
在 128 号公路立交桥上，我环顾了这条八车道公路的两边。两边都是一排排两层楼的建筑。路边的标牌上写着：“128 号公路：美国科技高速公路。”我继续骑行，经过霍尼韦尔的光电分部、雷神公司的贝德福德导弹系统分部、数字公司和 EG&G 公司。
At the Route 128 overpass, I looked both ways up and down the eight-lane highway. On both sides were continuous lines of two-story buildings. The sign on the side said, "Route 128: Amer ica's Technology Highway." I rode on, past Honeywell's ElectroOptic Division, past Raytheon's Bedford Missile Systems Division, past Digital, past E.G.& G.
所有这些地方都是由麻省理工学院毕业生创办或大量聘用。哈维家族在纽约拥有大部分权力，但最有权势的技术人员居住和工作在 7 号楼二十英里范围内。我很好奇在一栋低层建筑里工作会是什么样的，那里只有小隔间和很少的窗户。
All these places were either founded by or heavily populated by MIT grads. The Harveys have most of their power in New York, but the most powerful Techies live and work within twenty miles of Building 7. I wondered what it would be like to work in a lowrise building with cubicles and very few windows.
穿过康科德中心，经过肯·奥尔森的房子。肯·奥尔森 1950 年毕业于麻省理工学院，后来与杰伊·福雷斯特教授合作，在旋风计划中研究计算机内存技术，并从那里成立了一家公司——数字设备公司。肯身价十几亿美元，至今仍住在简朴的房子里。
On through Concord Center and past Ken Olsen's house. Ken Olsen graduated from MIT in '50, went on to work with Professor Jay Forrester on computer memory technology in Project Whirlwind, and from there spun off a company-Digital Equipment Corporation. Ken is worth a billion or two and still lives in a modest home.
再往前走，我看到了吉夫托普洛斯勤奋努力的成果。当然，不是全部成果，因为车道太长，从街上看不到整栋房子。隔壁是另一位热电公司创始人乔治·哈索普洛斯的房子。乔治向世人表明，你不必成为麻省理工学院的教授才能赚到一百万美元。对他来说，拥有机械工程博士学位和一个测量汽车尾气中氧化氮浓度的好主意就足够了。
Farther on, I saw the fruit of Gyftopoulos's industry. Well, not the whole fruit, because you can't see the whole house from the street because the driveway's so long. Next door was the house of the other Thermo Electron founder, George Hatsopoulos. George showed that you don't have to be a professor at MIT to make a million bucks. In his case, a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering and a good idea for how to measure the concentration of nitrogen oxide in automobile exhaust were sufficient.
回到城里，距离他们家不到五分钟车程，也许，如果我努力工作，我就能模仿他们所有人。
Back toward town Thermo Electron was less than a fiveminute drive from their houses. Maybe, if I worked hard, I could emulate all of them.
旅途很愉快，洗完澡后，就到了去苹果的时间。格林给了我一把电脑室的钥匙和一张软盘。
The ride felt good, and after my shower, it was Apple time. Greene had given me a key to the computer room and a floppy disk.
当时是下午两点，天气晴朗，如果可以的话，我很乐意继续骑车去康科德、卡莱尔、阿克顿或哈佛，但这不是我去剑桥的原因。
It was two o'clock, and sunny, and if I'd had my druthers I would have happily continued cycling on to Concord or Carlisle or Acton or Harvard, but that's not why I was in Cambridge.
回廊面朝内，与街道隔绝，窗外就是一棵树，漫射的阳光照亮了粉红色石灰岩墙壁的上半部分，是一个宁静的避难所。这里只有我的思绪，以及两位没有上过大学的家伙——沃兹尼亚克和乔布斯——所写的手册中的智慧。
The cloister, facing inward, shielded from the street, with the tree just outside the window and the diffuse sunlight brightening the upper part of the pink limestone walls, was a peaceful sanctuary. Here it was just my thoughts, and the wit of the manual written by two guys who hadn't gone to college, Wozniak and Jobs.
好的，苹果。我是用户。请友善一点。
Okay Apple. I'm a user. Be friendly.
苹果公司以身作则。他们使用的语言是 BASIC，大多数人学习编程时都用这种语言。在 BASIC 中，很容易理解示例程序的逻辑。我输入了示例程序，它们运行正常。这开始为我建立起因果关系；如果你输入了正确的内容，没有放错括号，没有拼写错误，并且完全、完美、一致地正确执行，它就会运行正常。
Apple taught by example. The language was BASIC, the language in which most people learn to program. In BASIC, it's fairly easy to follow the logic of the sample programs. I typed in the sample programs, and they worked. This began to establish a cause-and-effect relationship for me; if you type in the right thing and don't misplace parentheses and don't misspell anything and do it absolutely, perfectly, uniformly right, it works.
到六点钟，我已经完成了手册。这有点像听保罗·戴斯蒙的唱片，试着找出即兴的即兴乐段，然后用我的单簧管演奏。我会一次学一个乐句，一旦我知道保罗·戴斯蒙在做什么，他正在演奏什么和弦，他在修饰什么音阶，我就可以自己做实验，也许可以稍微改变一下顺序，尝试不同的音符排列。不知不觉中，我就成了一名程序员。你模仿这些模式，偶然发现新的组合，发展出自己的风格。时间消失了，我迷失在其中，这几乎变成了乐趣，而不是工作。
By six o'clock I'd finished the manual. It was sort of like listening to a Paul Desmond record and trying to pick out the improvisational riffs and play them by ear on my clarinet. I'd pick it up a phrase at a time, and once I knew what Paul Desmond was doing, what chords he was working from, what scales he was embellishing, I could experiment on my own, maybe change the order a little bit, try different permutations of the notes. Before I knew it I was a programmer. You imitate the patterns, and by accident you discover new combinations and develop your own style. The time disappeared and I became lost in it and it became almost fun, not work.
日落之后，办公室的灯光把窗户照得像一面镜子，我看见自己坐在电脑旁，想象着《新闻周刊》上“麻省理工学院的怀特”的照片，这位才华横溢的年轻工程学教授的研究正在解决世界能源和环境问题。我会穿着 V 领套头衫，靠在办公椅上，双手交叉放在脑后，手肘向外。背景中的书架上堆满了书。
After sunset the office light made the window a mirror, and I saw myself beside the computer and imagined the Newsweek picture of "MIT's White," the brilliant young engineering professor whose research is solving the world's energy and environmental problems. I'd wear a V-necked pullover, lean back in the desk chair, and have my hands clasped behind my head and elbows out. The bookcases in the background would be full.
回到气球上。是时候参考方程式和图画了。格林曾说过，我需要考虑我编写的任何算法（解决方法）中的信息流。这意味着我需要将我的三个方程式按顺序排列，以便一个计算的结果将输入到下一个计算的未知侧，该答案将输入到下一个计算的未知侧，依此类推。这就是我穿越时间并吹爆气球的方式。
Back to the balloon. Time to refer to the equations and the drawing. Greene had said I need to think of the flow of information in any algorithm (solution method) I write. That means I need to take my three equations and arrange them in an order so that the result of one calculation will feed into the unknown side of the next calculation, that answer will feed into the unknown side of the next calculation, and so on. This is how I will march through time and blow up my balloon.
苹果先生的标志是一只苹果，上面有一道彩虹，还有一口咬痕。苹果是知识树上的果实。彩虹代表着一次洪水就够了的承诺。一口咬痕听起来就像一个字节是 8 位。这一切意味着什么？
Mr. Apple's logo is an apple with a rainbow on it and a bite out of it. The apple is the fruit from the tree of knowledge. The rainbow is the promise that one flood was enough. A bite sounds like a byte is 8 bits. What does it all mean?
3月21日
March 21
办公室是研究生的大本营。我的办公室在实验室楼上，靠近 Chet Yeung 和 West 的办公室。走廊尽头有五间办公室。Ari 的办公室在我办公室的一侧。Ari 的一位同事是俄罗斯人，他于 1958 年与家人一起离开了苏联。Scott Rogers 在我办公室的另一侧。Ben Radovsky 办公室在走廊对面。
The office is home base for graduate students. Mine was upstairs from the lab, near those of Chet Yeung and West. There were five offices at the end of the hall. Ari's was on one side of mine. One of Ari's office mates was a Russian who'd left the Soviet Union in '58 with his family. Scott Rogers was on the other side of me. Ben Radovsky was across the hall.
史蒂夫·盖格与本和玛丽共用一间办公室。玛丽放了一个鱼缸，他们还在房间中央放了一个咖啡壶和一张大绘图桌。我们隔壁办公室的人经常会走进来，泡一杯茶或咖啡，拉把椅子到绘图桌旁，聊聊凸轮轴。来自北京的董先生和董太太就住在隔壁。他们经常用改装的电咖啡壶煮散发着奇怪气味的海藻状物质。
Steve Geiger shared the office with Ben and Mary. Mary had set up a fish tank, and they also had a coffeepot and a big drafting table in the center of the room. Often those of us from neighboring offices would walk in, make a cup of tea or cotl-e, pull a chair up to the drafting table, and talk camshafts. Mr. and Mrs. Tung from Beijing were next door. They often boiled seaweedlike materials that gave off strange smells in their adapted electric coffeepot.
办公室成为你社区意识的核心。每个部门都分为不同的专业。你在课堂上遇到的任何一个人都可能属于不同的小组，所以你没有理由在课外或课后见到他或她。也许在无限走廊或学生中心咖啡店偶尔会偶遇，但除此之外，你们就失去了联系。这也是为什么学院如此孤独的原因之一——知识和学生是割裂的。
The office becomes the core of your sense of community. Every department is divided into subspecialties. Anycue you meet in a class may be in a different group, so you have no reason to see him or her outside or after the class. There may be an occasional chance encounter on the infinite corridor or in the student center coffee shop, but other than that, you lose contact. It's part of why the institute is such a lonely place-the knowledge and the students are segmented.
我和玛丽一边在绘图桌旁喝茶一边聊天，韦斯特打断了我。
I chatted with Mary while drinking tea at the drafting table, and West interrupted.
“玛丽，我们需要谈谈燃料系统。保罗在实验中没有尽到自己的责任——
"Mary, we need to talk about the fuel system. Paul's not pulling his weight in the experiment and--
电话响了。
The phone rang.
韦斯特接起电话，回答说：“玛丽现在正在开会。稍后再打过来。”然后挂断了电话。
West picked it up, answered, "Mary's in a meeting now. Call back later," and hung up.
玛丽气得满脸通红。她站起来对韦斯特说：“你以后不许再这样做。不管你是谁，不管你有多大权势，你都没有权利拦截这样的电话。”
Mary's face turned red with rage. She stood up and said to West, "Don't you ever do that again. I don't care who you are or what kind of power you have. You have no right to intercept a call like that."
“嗯，我觉得是的，”韦斯特说。“你怎么看，佩珀？”
"Well, I think I do," West said. "What do you think, Pepper?"
这样做很卑鄙。你有权力，而且因为我还在缓刑期，所以我需要所有能找到的有权势的朋友。“无可奉告，”我回答道。
It was a scummy thing to do. You have power, and, because I'm on probation I need all the powerful friends I can get. "No comment," I answered.
韦斯特继续说道：“好吧，玛丽，我想让你来接替保罗。我们必须继续推进这个项目。”
West continued. "Well anyway, Mary, I want you to cover for Paul. We've got to keep the project moving."
等韦斯特走远了，玛丽才开口说话，“你为什么不支持我？我以为你是我朋友呢。”
After West was out of earshot Mary said, "Why didn't you stick up for me? I thought you were my friend."
“你做得很好。我不想卷入其中。此外，他还能让我摆脱债务，”我说。
"You did pretty well for yourself. I didn't want to get involved. Besides, he's keeping me out of debt," I said.
“好吧，我想我们知道你的优先事项是什么了。谢谢。非常感谢。”
"Well, I guess we know where your priorities are. Thanks. Thanks a lot."
“嘿，听着。我很抱歉。我会努力在某一天弥补你的。”
"Hey, look. I'm sorry. I'll try to make it up to you someday."
3 月 25 日
March 25
La chasse aux fuites。寻找泄漏。我以前所未有的高压缩比启动了 RCM。这是好消息。坏消息是冲程顶部的压力大约是所需压力的一半。这意味着有泄漏。
La chasse aux fuites. The search for leaks. I'd fired the RCM at a compression ratio higher than ever before attempted. That was the good news. The bad news was that the pressure at the top of the stroke was about half as high as needed. That meant there were leaks.
当两块金属紧挨在一起时，机器内部的压力会将你试图压缩的液体或气体挤出，从而导致机器泄漏。我向新任助理教授 Chet Yeung 寻求帮助。当 West 准备在 128 号公路上创办公司时，他逐渐成为了我的导师。
Machinery leaks when two pieces of metal are next to each other and the pressure inside the machine pushes out whatever liquid or gas you're trying to compress. I asked Chet Yeung, the new assistant professor, who was gradually becoming my adviser as West was preparing for the start-up of his company on Route 128, for help.
切特无所不知。他出生于香港，五岁时就制造了 Heathkit 收音机。高中期间，他曾在一个夏天担任机械师；另一个夏天，他在一家机床厂担任绘图员。还有一个夏天，他担任计算机程序员。这一切都发生在他从加州理工学院获得应用数学学位之前。切特想成为一名数学家，虽然还不够优秀，但已经走在了成为一名优秀工程学教授的道路上。
Chet knew everything. Born in Hong Kong, at age five he had built Heathkit radios. One summer during high school he worked as a machinist; another summer he worked as a draftsman in a machine tool plant. Yet another summer he worked as a computer programmer. This was all before he graduated from Cal Tech with an applied mathematics degree. Chet wanted to be a mathematician, wasn't quite good enough to be a great one, but was well on his way to becoming a great engineering professor.
“所以你必须放一些 O 形圈，”他说。“你必须查看每个表面，找出可能存在泄漏的路径，并将它们放在那里。”切特从身后的书架上抽出十本笔记本中的一本，翻到其中描述 O 形圈设计的一页。O 形圈是一种细长的橡胶圈，可装入凹槽中，防止空气或水泄漏。
"So you have to put some O-rings in," he said. "And you have to look at every surface to see where the leakage paths might be and put them there." Chet pulled one of the ten notebooks off the bookshelf behind him and turned to a page in it that described O-ring design. An O-ring is a skinny rubber donut that fits in a groove and prevents the air or water from leaking.
切特快速绘制了凹槽尺寸的草图，列出了 O 形圈的尺寸清单，然后让我去找尼克，让他加工凹槽。
Chet made a quick sketch of the groove dimensions, made a list of the O-ring sizes, then sent me down to Nick to have him machine the grooves.
尼克正在铣削零件，收音机里正播放着“开始跳贝居安舞”。
Nick was milling a part, and "Begin the Beguine" was playing on the radio.
“船长，你听到新闻了吗？”尼克问道。“一架飞机刚刚从迈阿密起飞，不得不返航。负责重修发动机的机械师忘记装上一些 O 形圈，轴承油几乎全部漏出来。想象一下那种情形。幸好没有人丧生。”
"You hear the news, Cap'n?" Nick asked. "A plane just took off from Miami and had to turn around. The mechanic who rebuilt the engine forgot to put some O-rings in and the bearing oil almost all leaked out. Imagine that. 'S lucky no one got killed."
O 形圈很重要。
O-rings are important.
3 月 29 日
March 29
所有 O 形环都安装到位后，是时候进行另一次发射了。轴处于最靠后的位置，由轴后部槽中的一小块金属固定住。轴后部有一个摆锤，基本上是一根一端带铰链的管子。这样做的目的是提高罐内的压力，然后让摆锤摆动到轴的后部。这小块金属足够坚固，可以避免轴在气压的拉力下断裂，但当摆锤撞击它时，它不够坚固。摆锤是折断轴后部的管子。
All O-rings in place, it was time for another firing. The shaft was in its backmost position, held in place by a little piece of metal in a slot in the back of the shaft. There was a pendulum, basically a pipe with a hinge on one end, at the back of the shaft. The idea was to raise the pressure in the tank and then let the pendulum swing into the back of the shaft. The little piece of metal was strong enough to avoid breaking with the pull of the shaft from the air pressure, but not strong enough to hold when the pendulum hit it. The pendulum was the pipe that broke the shaft's back.
当我们在安装新 O 形圈的情况下尝试首次点火时，Chet、Scott、Nick 和我都在测试室内。轴已安装好，我打开阀门，让油箱的驱动压力增大。
Chet, Scott, Nick, and I were in the test cell when we tried the first firing with the new O-rings in place. The shaft was set up and I opened the valve to let the driving pressure on the tank build up.
空气充满油箱时发出嘶嘶声和嗡嗡声，压力表的读数从 10 磅/平方英寸 (psi) 上升到 20 磅/平方英寸 (psi)。第一次发出“砰”的一声是在 52 psi 时。我关上了阀门。我的脉搏上升到了 90。
The air made a hissing, ringing sound as it filled the tank and the gauge climbed up through 10, 20, 30 pounds per square inch (psi). The first thunk noise came at 52 psi. I closed the valve. My pulse was up to 90.
“那是什么？”我问。
"What was that?" I asked.
尼克站在后面，手里拿着钟摆，回答道：“我记得这个，船长，这是第一个。没什么好怕的。金属正在自我调节。”
Nick answered from the back where he was holding the pendulum. "I remember that one, Cap'n; that's the first one. Nothing to be afraid of. The metal's just adjusting itself."
“继续提高压力，”切特在隔间的另一边调整示波器的亮度时说道。示波器就像我以前在威尔实验室看到的一样，基本上就是一台只有一个通道或轨迹的电视机。它的电子束在屏幕上从左到右移动。随着 RCM 气缸中的压力上升，电子束会向上偏转，并形成测量气缸压力与时间的发光图。示波器是我们观察极快世界的眼睛，观察那些在几分之一秒内发生的事情。
"Keep raising the pressure," Chet said from across the cell where he was adjusting the brightness of the oscilloscope. The oscilloscope was just like the ones I'd seen before in Weare's lab, basically a TV set with only one channel, or trace. Its beam of electrons went from left to right on the screen. As the pressure rose in the RCM's cylinder, the electron beam would be deflected upward and make a glowing graph of measured cylinder pressure versus time. The oscilloscope was our eye on the world of the very fast, the things that happen in small fractions of a second.
当压力达到 90 psi 时，又传来一声巨响，并且水箱开始吱吱作响。
At 90 psi there was another thunk and the tank started to creak.
“这是有史以来的最高点，船长。任何更大的压力都是未知领域，”尼克一边说，一边用空着的手划了个十字。
"That's as high as it was ever run, Cap'n. Any more pressure is unexplored territory," Nick said as he crossed himself with his free hand.
“我们把它提高到 110 吧，”切特说。“这个水平仍然有足够的安全系数。我们至少需要这么多的压力来推动气缸在更高压缩比下产生的压力。”
"Let's raise it to 110," Chet said. "There's still plenty of safety factor at that level. We'll need at least that much pressure to push through the pressure the cylinder will develop with the higher compression ratio."
最响亮的一声是在 105 磅/平方英寸时发出的，但什么也没发生，所以我继续将压力调到 110 磅/平方英寸。我的脉搏仍然随着压力而上升。我关闭了阀门。
The loudest thunk yet came at 105 but nothing blew up, so I kept going to 110 psi. My pulse still rose with the pressure. I closed the valve.
“准备好了吗，尼克？”
"Ready, Nick?"
“并且等待，船长。”
"And waiting, Cap'n."
尼克放开了钟摆。
Nick let go of the pendulum.
一切就像一声枪响，一瞬间就结束了。示波器上的轨迹上下摆动。
It was over in an instant like a gunshot. The trace on the oscilloscope bobbed up and down.
“这看起来是个好消息，也有坏消息，”切特说。
"Looks like good news and bad news," Chet said.
“你是什么意思？”我问他。
"What do you mean?" I asked him.
“我认为不再有泄漏，但我们需要更多的压力。活塞向前移动，反弹回来，向前移动，反弹回来，随着压缩气体冷却，活塞终于完全向前移动了。”
"I think there are no more leaks, but we need more pressure. The piston went forward, bounced back, went forward, bounced back, and as the compressed gas cooled, the piston finally made it all the way forward."
这一切都发生在半秒钟之内。
All in half a second.
切特补充道：“我们需要一个更强大的坦克，也许还需要一个新的启动装置，也许还需要一根新的轴。我们来看看轴吧。尼克，你手边有千分尺吗？”
Chet added, "We're going to need a stronger tank, maybe a new starting mechanism, maybe a new shaft. Let's take a look at the shaft. Nick, do you have your micrometer handy?"
“是的，教授先生，”尼克说道。
"Yes, sir, Professor," Nick said.
我们将轴拉回到预发射位置后，切特将千分尺拧紧在轴的摆锤端，然后将其沿轴向下移动到机器的后部。
After we pulled the shaft back into prefiring position, Chet tightened the micrometer on the pendulum end of the shaft and then moved it down the shaft to the back of the machine.
“这就是我担心的，”他说道，此时千分尺沿着轴的长度变得越来越松。“我们也需要一根新轴。这根轴在更大的力的作用下被拉伸，因此变得更长更细。之前它就像是支撑着一辆丰田汽车，现在它支撑着一辆卡迪拉克汽车。”
"That's what I was afraid of," he said as the micrometer became looser and looser along the length of the shaft. "We'll need a new shaft, too. This one has been stretching with the higher force, so it becomes longer and skinnier. Before it was like it was supporting a Toyota; now it's supporting a Cadillac."
新的油箱、新的轴、新的启动装置。这会让我的牢房刑期延长几个月？
New tank, new shaft, new starting mechanism. How many months will that add to my term in the cell?
4 月 20 日
April 20
春天已经到来，终于变得温暖起来。水仙花盛开，天空蔚蓝，飘着几朵大朵的云，帆船又在查尔斯河上航行了。当我在绿色建筑前遇见玛丽时，我感觉自己重获新生。
Spring was fully with us, consistently warm at last. The daffodils were out, the sky was blue with some big breezy clouds, and the sailboats were on the Charles again. I felt newborn when I met Mary in front of the Green Building.
“你听说过吉夫托普罗斯的事吗？”她问道。
"Did you hear about Gyftopoulos?" she asked.
“没有。他怎么了？”我问。
"No. What about him?" I said.
“他心脏病发作了。”
"He had a heart attack."
所以他毕竟是人。我想知道他是否有过濒死体验，是否在死亡阴影的山谷中漂浮了片刻，说现在还不是时候——还有太多学生要教——或者他是否只是昏了过去，除了胸口的疼痛什么都没有了。
So he's a human being after all. I wondered whether he'd had a near-death experience, whether he'd floated up above his body for a few moments in the valley of the shadow of death and said it's not time yet-there are too many more students to teach-or whether he'd just blacked out and there was nothing but the pain in his chest.
“他还好吗？”我问道。
"Is he OK?" I asked.
“是的。我听说他刚刚从重症监护室出来。他会住院几周，但他们认为病情不严重。他可能需要减肥并戒烟，”她回答道。
"Yes. I heard he just got out of intensive care. He'll be in the hospital for a couple of weeks, but they think it's a mild one. He'll probably have to take off some weight and quit smoking," she answered.
“我真心希望他能挺过来。他是个好人。顺便问一下，你那个呆头呆脑的实验室伙伴怎么样了？我有一段时间没在实验室里看到他了。”
"I sure hope he pulls through. He's a good man. By the way, what ever happened to your dorky lab partner? I haven't seen him around the lab for a while."
“他被开除了。他们只是让他坐下，告诉他不能做研究，现在他就走了。我想他现在在做某种计算机咨询之类的工作，”她说。
"He was booted out. They just sat him down and said to him that he couldn't do research and now he's gone. I think he's doing some kind of computer consulting or something," she said.
这些家伙拼尽全力。如果你不能发挥出色，你就会被淘汰。
These guys play for keeps. If you can't produce, you're history.
4 月 22 日
April 22
我在无尽的走廊上碰到了吉姆·斯图尔特。常春藤盟校的睿智神色已经消失，被他在作业和考试中取得的 50% 的成绩打败了。他的计算器挂在腰带上。
I bumped into Jim Stuart going down the infinite corridor. The Ivy League knowing look had faded, had been beaten out of his eyes by all the 50 percents he'd scored on problem sets and exams. His calculator was on his belt.
“吉姆，这个计算器是怎么回事？”我问道。
"What's the deal with the calculator, Jim?" I asked.
“那又怎么样？”
"What about it?"
“它在你的腰带上。你不记得了吗？我敢打赌，如果你的高中同学做这种事，你肯定会朝他们扔纸团。”我说。
"It's on your belt. Don't you remember? I bet you would have thrown spitballs at anyone in your high school who did that," I said.
“哦，”他停顿了一下。“是的。嗯，这实际上是一种非常方便的携带方式。这个盒子可以保护计算器，还可以解放我的手臂来携带书籍和其他东西，而不必担心掉落它。”
"Oh," he paused. "Yeah. Well, it's actually a really convenient way to carry it. The case protects the calculator, and it frees up my arms to carry books and other things without worrying about dropping it."
功能大于形式。
Function is greater than form.
5 月 12 日
May 12
格林说：“你们开了个好头，我原本希望你们能取得更大的进步。”
"You made a good start, and I would have expected more progress by now," Greene said.
“我需要更多时间，先生。夏天实验室里的事情应该会轻松一些，所以我应该能够完成气球问题。此外，整个计算机建模业务对我来说有点新。我完全不知道如何让方程式流动起来。”
"I need some more time, sir. Things should ease up in the lab during the summer, so I should be able to finish off the balloon problem. Besides, this whole business of computer modeling is kind of new to me. I'm just totally stumped on how to make the equations flow."
他说：“你必须自己弄明白这一点。我可以教你，但学习和被教之间有很大区别。你知道，这有点像在国外学习语言。假设你去市场，想买一些没有摆放的东西，比如苹果。如果你知道 100 个该语言的单词，你会用它们全部来尝试表达你需要的第 101 个单词。在这个过程中，你可能会从店主那里学到更多单词。当你终于学会了第 101 个单词，咬了一口苹果时，你已经内化了知识，你永远不会忘记它。明白了吗？”
He said, "It's important that you figure this out for yourself. I could teach you, but there's a big difference between learning and being taught. You know, it's sort of like trying to learn the language in a foreign country. Say you go out to the market and you want to buy something that's not on display-apples, for example. If you know 100 words in the language, you'll use all of them trying to communicate that 101st word that you need. In the process you may learn a few more words from the shopkeeper. When you finally hit on that 101st word, and you're taking a bite out of the apple, you've internalized the knowledge, and you'll never forget it. Capisce?"
“那么我要怎么做才能得到 B 呢？”我问道。
"So what do I have to do to get a B?" I asked.
他回答说：“如果你能让气球模型按照你现在设置的方式工作，并在实际压力和弹性下产生有意义的结果，我会给你 B 级。我给你在暑假结束前完成这件事。如果之后还有时间，你可以让模型更逼真一些，我会给你 A 级。这与能源工程关系不大，但这是一个好问题，这就是我们称之为独立研究的原因。顺便问一下，你有没有想出更多熵的例子？”
He answered, "If you can make your balloon model work as you've now set it up and produce meaningful results with realistic pressures and elasticities, I'll give you a B. I'll give you till the end of the summer to do that. If there's any time left after that, you can make the model a little more realistic and I'll give you an A. This isn't related much to energy engineering but it's a good problem and that's why we call it independent study. By the way, have you come up with any more examples of entropy?"
“嗯，是的。我还想到了几个，”我说。“我以前参加过自行车比赛，在比赛中取得好成绩的关键是始终在 100 人的比赛中保持 15 人的领先。一旦领先者领先大部队一两分钟，就永远不会被追上。领先者之间的配合非常默契，你只需要与风抗争十五分之一，就像你独自冲出大部队一样。大部队通常无法组织起来弥补差距，所以领先者的领先优势只会越来越大。”
"Uh, yeah. I've thought of a couple more," I said. "I used to race bicycles, and the key to doing well in races was always to be in a 15-man breakaway from the 100-man field. Once the breakaway is a minute or two ahead of the pack it'll never be caught. The guys in the break work together smoothly, and you only have to fight the wind one-fifteenth as much as you would if you sprinted off the front of the pack by yourself. The pack generally can't organize itself to bridge the gap, so the breakaway's lead just gets bigger and bigger."
“嗯，”他回答道。“因此，关于如何更有效地分担风荷载的信息流在突围队中比在大队中更有效。更好的信息流意味着更好的组织和更低的熵。我喜欢这个。另一个例子是什么？”
"Umhmmm," he answered. "So the flow of information as to how to share the wind load more efficiently is more efficient in the breakaway than in the pack. Better information flow means better organization and lower entropy. I like it. What's the other example?"
“我在《波士顿环球报》上看到，波士顿的风比堪萨斯大，但波士顿并不适合安装风车，因为风向总是在变化。所以波士顿的风车要花很长时间才能转向迎风，而等到它迎风时，风向可能又变了。”我说着，在他的黑板上画了一幅画。
"I read in the Globe that Boston is windier than Kansas, but Boston isn't as good a place for windmills because the wind direction is always changing. So a windmill in Boston would spend a lot of time turning to face the wind, and by the time it faces the wind, the wind direction may have changed again," I said, and drew a picture on his blackboard.
“因此，在极限情况下，”格林补充道，“风车会来回转动，永远不会迎风飞行足够长的时间以产生任何动力。风车会转动，但这种转动不会向螺旋桨输送任何动力。你开始将熵内化。”
"So in the limiting case," Greene added, "the windmill will turn back and forth and never face the wind long enough to produce any power. The windmill turns, but that turning results in no power delivered to the propellor. You're beginning to internalize entropy."
5 月 15 日。
May 15.
海伍德的考试在 1-134 室。我特意早点到考场，找了门卫把锁好的门打开，整理好我的书和笔记本，找到墙上的插座，把借来的计算器插上，削好十二支 2 号铅笔，用牙线剔牙。1:15 时，一切都准备就绪，距离考试开始还有十五分钟。
Heywood's exam was in Room 1-134. I made a point of arriving early, finding the janitor to open the locked door, arranging my books and notebooks, finding a wall outlet, plugging my borrowed calculator into the wall outlet, sharpening my twelve number two pencils, flossing my teeth. Everything was in order at 1: 15, fifteen minutes before the exam would start.
我在四套习题和期末作业上的成绩都高于平均水平。我肯定在 B 级，当然，除非我在期末考试中失败。如果成绩远低于平均水平，我就会进入 C 级并被赶出家门。
My scores on the four problem sets and the term project were above average. I was definitely in B territory, unless, of course, I choked on the final. A well-below-average score would put me into C-land and onto the street.
我走到外面，坐在基利安庭院的亨利·摩尔雕塑上。我试图理清思绪，以便接受我需要传递的灵感。当我闭上眼睛时，新修剪的草坪散发着甜美的香味。
I went outside to sit on the Henry Moore sculpture in Killian Court. I tried to clear my thoughts, to be receptive to the inspiration I'd need to pass. The fresh-cut lawn smelled sweet when I closed my eyes.
离发布还有五分钟，我回到教室。本·拉多夫斯基和另外两个人站在我的桌子旁边笑。走近一点，我看到我的计算器摔坏在地板上，十二支 2 号铅笔随意地放在相邻的桌子下面。
At five minutes to launch I went back to the classroom. Ben Radovsky and two other guys were standing next to my desk and laughing. A little closer, I saw my calculator broken on the floor, and the twelve number two pencils at rest randomly underneath the neighboring desks.
“发生什么事了？”我惊慌地问道。
"What happened?" I asked, panic-stricken.
本说：“我没看到你的计算器线，我被它绊倒了。”
Ben said, "I didn't see your calculator cord and I tripped over it."
他的声音里没有一丝道歉的意味。显然，我的计算器装置设计有缺陷，对公众构成了危险。别介意我的办公桌和墙上插座之间的距离不到一英尺；别介意任何有思想的人都会绕着另一边走。
There was no tone of apology in his voice. Obviously, my calculator setup was a faulty design and had presented a hazard to the public. Never mind there was less than a foot between my desk and the wall outlet; never mind that any thinking human being would have walked around the other way.
“是啊，那有什么好笑的？”我问他。
"Yeah, and what's so funny about that?" I asked him.
“好吧，你得承认，你如此精心地安排一切，并试图提前计划好一切，然后发生了这种事，这有点可笑。这种事会发生在伍迪·艾伦身上，”本笑着说。
"Well, you've got to admit it's kind of funny that you set things up so carefully and tried to plan it all in advance and then this happens. It's the kind of thing that would happen to Woody Allen," Ben smirked.
“好吧，没有计算器我就没办法了，”我说。“你有多余的吗？”
"Well, I'm screwed without a calculator," I said. "Do you have an extra one?"
“不，我只带了一个，而且我需要它。”
"No, I only brought one, and I need it."
阿里拍拍我的肩膀。
Ari tapped me on the shoulder.
“拿去吧，我的朋友，”他说，“我带了两个备用的。别担心，它已经充满电了。”
"Here, my friend," he said. "I brought two extras. Don't worry; it's fully charged."
“哦，太好了，非常感谢。你救了我的命，”我回答道，想给他一个拥抱。“但你为什么要带三个来呢？”
"Oh great, thanks a lot. You've saved my life," I answered, wanting to give him a hug. "But why'd you bring three?"
他回答说：“这只是良好工程冗余系统的原则之一。”
He answered, "It's just one of the principles of good engineering-redundant systems."
章节
C H A P T E R
10
10
掌控之中
In Control
日程：
Schedule:
1982 年夏季：2.023 系统动力学与控制 (Miller)
Summer '82: 2.023 System Dynamics and Control (Miller)
2.999 独立学习（格林）
2.999 Independent Study (Greene)
2.996 论文
2.996 Thesis
六月初，吉夫托普洛斯走出沃克食堂。他看上去瘦了整整二十磅，走起路来比心脏病发作前更慢、更犹豫。他已经意识到自己不会永远待在麻省理工学院，这一点从他的眼睛里就能看出来。我第一次感觉到，我比他领先了五六十年，拥有他所没有的东西。当他打招呼时，他的声音有点犹豫，就像他的步态一样。
In early June Gyftopoulos walked out of the Walker dining hall. He looked a good twenty pounds thinner, and he walked slowly, more tentatively than before the heart attack. He'd wakened up to the fact that he wasn't going to be at MIT forever; you could see it in his eyes. For the first time I felt I had something he didn'tfifty or sixty years ahead of me. When he said hello, his voice was a little tentative, like his walk.
“是的，我恢复得很好，佩珀。谢谢你关心。我一开始每周上班两天，然后逐渐增加到五天。”
"Yes, I'm recuperating fine, Pepper. Thank you for asking. I'm starting by coming in to work two days a week, and gradually I will work back up to five."
“很高兴见到您回来，先生。”
"It's good to see you back, sir."
“回来真好。”
"It's good to be back."
我在海伍德的课上勉强得了 B。并不是因为我的期末考试成绩很出色，而是班上超过一半的学生的成绩至少和我一样模糊。模糊程度如此之深，以至于海伍德教授在发回的试卷评论中写道：“虽然你们中的一些人完全掌握了所呈现的概念，但你们中的许多人并没有表现出我所期望的条理性和清晰度。你们每个人都可以问问自己，‘我是否想把这张试卷发给我的父母，让他们看看我在麻省理工学院所做的伟大工作？’”
I squeaked out the B in Heywood's class. It wasn't that my performance on the final was stellar, but that over half the class's performance was at least as murky as mine. So murky that Professor Heywood, in the critique he handed back with the exams, wrote, "While some of you showed complete mastery of the concepts presented, many of you did not show the organization and clarity I would have expected. Each of you might ask yourself, 'Would I want to send this exam to my parents to show them the great work I'm doing at MIT?'"
他知道该如何把针头放在我们能感觉到的地方。但 B 就是 B，我至少还要在这里待三个月。
He knew how to put the needle where we would feel it. But a B is a B and I'm here for another three months minimum.
暑假期间，学院氛围轻松。由于本科生不在，紧张情绪会降低好几个数量级。你通常只需修一门课程，教授们也去度假了。麻省理工学院的日间夏令营正在举行，年轻的辅导员们会带领一大群小孩子去游泳池和健身房。
The institute is laid back in the summertime. Because the undergrads are away, the nervous energy level is reduced by several orders of magnitude. You generally take only one course, and professors go on vacation. The MIT day camp is in session, and fresh young counselors lead large groups of little kids to the swimming pool and the gym.
不过，有几个朋友离开了，我很想念他们。马特·阿姆斯特朗以创纪录的 1 年时间完成了硕士学位，然后去欧文斯康明公司担任高级研究科学家，年薪 3.5 万美元。迈克尔·皮卡迪留在了 TPP，在所有课程中都获得了 A 的成绩，但从未找到资助；他转学到普林斯顿大学，在那里他们给了他全额资助。艾克·托马斯在第二学期得到了两个 C，和玛丽的实验室搭档一样，被开除了。而阿姆里特，那个认为能源很容易的壁球运动员，在维也纳找到了一份为欧佩克模拟世界石油需求的工作。
Several friends were gone, though, and I missed them. Matt Armstrong had finished his master's degree in record time1 year-and was off to a job for $35K as senior research scientist for Owens Coming. Michael Picardi had stayed in TPP, had earned A's in all his classes, but had never found funding; he transferred to Princeton, where they gave him full financial support. Ike Thomas received two C's the second term, and, like Mary's lab partner, was given the boot. And Amrit, the squash player who thought that energy was easy, had landed a job modeling world oil demand for OPEC in Vienna.
MIT 不同于法学院、商学院或医学院。人们按照自己的时间表来来去去，所以没有“1984 届机械工程硕士学位学生”之类的说法。这里没有凝聚力；除了你自己的能力（或者缺乏这种能力）之外，什么也没有，你无法结识新朋友。
MIT is unlike law, business, or medical school. People come and go on their own schedules, so there is not, for example, a "Class of 1984 Mechanical Engineering Master's Degree Students." There's no cohesion; there's nothing but your own ability, or lack thereof, to meet people and make friends.
我唯一上过的暑期班是 2023 系统动力学与控制。这是一门本科班，但暑期班上主要由 Rohsenow 亲切地称为“海军小伙子”的人上课。就像我在 Rohsenow 的传热课上遇到的那些人一样，他们一般都比其他研究生年长，正在攻读硕士学位。
My only summer class was Two-oh-two-three-System Dynamics and Control. It's an undergraduate class, but the summer version was populated mainly by what Rohsenow affectionately referred to as "the Navy Guys." Like the ones I'd met in Rohsenow's heat transfer class, they were generally older than the other graduate students and were working toward master's degrees.
聪明的海军小伙子们都曾就读于安纳波利斯、普渡大学或佐治亚理工学院。也有相当一部分人很笨，我认为他们会在考试中帮上忙。然而，海军教授团队合作、组织和纪律：海军小伙子们在习题上互相帮助，他们以前的考试档案无可挑剔，他们努力工作，注意力集中。他们也习惯了睡眠不足。这些品质可以弥补愚蠢，所以我也必须努力提高这门课的成绩。
The smart navy guys had been to the academy at Annapolis, or Purdue, or maybe Georgia Tech. There was a good percentage of dumb ones, too, and I thought they would help the curve on the tests. However, the navy teaches teamwork, organization, and discipline: the navy guys help one another on the problem sets, their files of previous exams are impeccable, they work hard, and they concentrate well. They're also used to sleep deprivation. These qualities can make up for stupidity, so I would have to work for my grade in this class, too.
“反馈控制系统是使一切有效事物运转的根本，”戴维·米勒在 13 号楼对学生们说。“一切事物本质上都是不稳定的，反馈回路将一个不稳定的系统改变为一个稳定系统。例如，走路是不稳定的；只要看看一个试图弄清楚这一点的婴儿就知道了。他或她还没有弄清楚或对自己进行编程，以了解应用于伺服马达（肌肉）的正确增益。所以他经常撞到刹车，或者更确切地说是撞到地毯。但逐渐地，我们确实调整了增益，我们就可以走路了。”
"Feedback control systems are what makes anything that works work," David Miller said to the class in Building 13. "Everything is inherently unstable, and the feedback loop takes an unstable system and changes the system equation to make it into a stable system. For example, walking is unstable; just look at a baby trying to figure it out. He or she hasn't yet figured out or programmed himself to know the right gains to apply to his servomotors-his muscles. So he hits the stops a lot, or rather the carpet. But gradually we do get our gains tuned, and we can walk."
戴维停顿了一下，然后继续说，“但在你能够控制系统之前，你需要能够对系统的性能进行建模。我们已经研究出了许多实现这一点的技术。这是课程的第一部分。然后我们将继续研究如何找到我们需要的增益，以应用于我们在课程第一部分中组装的开环系统。这基本上就是控制 - 建模开环系统并找到闭环增益，这里所说的增益是指你推动系统做你想做的事情的力度和速度。”
David paused a second, then continued, But before you can control a system, you need to be able to model the performance of a system. We've worked out a number of techniques for doing this. That's the first part of the course. Then we'll go on to figure out how to find the gains we need to apply to the open loop systems we've put together in the first part of the course. That's basically what controls are-modeling open-loop systems and finding closed-loop gains, where by gain I mean how hard and fast you push the system to do what you want."
模范模范。最终，我会毫不脸红地使用这个词。大卫确实做到了。他看上去好像快三十岁了，留着一头卷曲的头发，他说他儿子的小联盟队友们会拽着这头头发说“这是真的吗？”他非常聪明、有才华、热情洋溢。他还没有拿到博士学位，所以他的水平和我们差不多，对我们的迟钝有些同情。另外，他似乎真的很喜欢教书。
Model model model. Eventually I'll be able to use that word without blushing. David certainly did. He looked as if he were pushing thirty, and had a curly mop of hair that he said his son's little league teammates pulled on, saying "Is this real?" He was exuberantly bright, talented, enthusiastic. He hadn't yet finished his Ph.D., so he was close enough to our level to have some compassion for our slowness. Plus, he really seemed to love to teach.
他的博士学位将使他跻身玛丽告诉我的麻省理工学院的立方行列。这些是少数才华横溢的人，他们的本科成绩足以让他们进入麻省理工学院的研究生院，然后通过博士资格考试，并成功完成博士论文答辩。足够好的本科成绩意味着几乎全 A，因为如果这意味着更少的话，就不会有来自其他地方的研究生空间了——比如我。
His Ph.D. would put him among the MIT-cubed ranks that Mary had told me about. These are the talented few whose undergraduate grades are good enough to get them into MIT grad school, who then pass the doctoral qualifying exams, and successfully defend their doctoral theses. Good enough undergraduate grades means almost straight A's, because if it meant any less there wouldn't be room for graduate students from anywhere else-like me.
大卫的博士论文是制作一个小型水下机器人。一旦完成，它将能够在深埋的沉船周围爬行，例如泰坦尼克号；捡起残骸；并将摄像机信息发回水面的船只控制室。
David's Ph.D. thesis was to make a little underwater robot work. Once he was done, it would be able to crawl around deeply buried shipwrecks, the Titanic, for example; pick up debris; and send video camera messages back up to the control room of the ship on the surface.
他继续讲课。“基本上，一旦你知道如何建模，你就可以建模任何东西。无论是机械、流体、热、化学、电气还是生物系统，建模的概念都是一样的。你们当中有人有自己正在做的事情的例子想让我讲一下吗？”
He continued his lecture. "So basically once you know how to model things, you can model anything. It doesn't matter whether it's a mechanical, fluid, thermal, chemical, electrical, or biological system. The concepts of modeling are the same. Do any of you have any examples from what you're doing you'd like me to go over?"
蝙蝠侠，真是一箭双雕啊。我举起了手。“我一直在研究这个问题，如何模拟一个充满空气的气球。”“模型”这个词自然而然地脱口而出。
Holy kill two birds with one stone, Batman. I raised my hand. "I've been working on this one problem, how to model a balloon being filled up with air." The word model rolled off my tongue naturally.
大卫毫不犹豫地画出了我在三月份花了十天才弄清楚的图景。他很快地建立了我在苹果电脑上编写的方程式，并用二零二三的语言表达了这个问题。与我的模型唯一的不同是，他给气球的表皮增加了质量，并增加了一个他称之为阻尼器的东西。
Without missing a beat, David drew the picture that had taken me ten days to intuit in March. He quickly set up the equations I'd been trying to program on the Apple and expressed the problem in the parlance of two-oh-two-three. The only difference from my model was that he gave mass to the skin of the balloon and added something he called a dashpot.
“因此，你的气球问题将是一个计算从流体压力到气球外壳质量的能量流、气球外壳的弹性（弹簧）和气球的内部摩擦（阻尼器）的问题。阻尼器总是会减慢质量的运动，无论气球是膨胀还是收缩，”他总结道。“如果你在系统上设置一个反馈回路，比如说，在罐内压力变化时保持气球内压力恒定，你就会遇到飞机增压系统设计师面临的同样问题。”
"And so your balloon problem will be a matter of accounting for the energy flow from the pressure of the fluid to the mass of the skin of the balloon, the elasticity of the skin of the balloon (the spring), and the internal friction of the balloon (the dashpot). The dashpot always slows down the motion of the mass, whether the balloon is expanding or contracting," he summarized. "If you put a feedback loop on the system, to, say, maintain a constant pressure in the balloon as the pressure in the tank varies, you'd have the same problem designers of airplane pressurization systems face."
因此学习吹气球是有原因的。
So there's a reason to learn to blow up a balloon.
6 月 22 日
June 22
又到了一场马戏表演的时间了——研究赞助商会议。身穿棕蓝两色制服的人从皮奥里亚、达文波特和哥伦布飞过来，看看我们是否取得了进展。实际上，他们每四个月来一次是个好主意，因为在这四个月的最后三周，我们取得了很大进展。
Time for another dog and pony show-a research sponsors' meeting. The men in brown and blue had flown in from Peoria, Davenport, and Columbus to see whether we'd made any progress. Actually, it was a good idea for them to come every four months because in the last three weeks of the four months we made a lot of progress.
“我们必须为会议取得一些成果，”切特在海伍德教授的期末考试结束后说道。这总是有一定意义的。所以我们开始更换 RCM 的零部件。新的驱动气压罐已经安装到位，我们已经将其安装到位。新的轴已经订购，我们知道在会议结束之前，不可能对整个机器进行进一步的试验。然后，目标就变成了在测试单元中完成尽可能多的其他硬件。
"We gotta get some results for the meeting," Chet had said just after Professor Heywood's final. It was always something. So we'd cranked to replace what we could of the components of the RCM. The new driving air pressure tank was in, and we had mounted it in place. The new shaft was on order, and we knew there was no hope of further trials of the whole machine until after the meeting. The target then became a matter of completing as much other hardware in the test cell as possible.
斯科特和我把机器分成前半部分和后半部分；他负责设计后部新启动机制的部件，我负责设计机器前部的燃料输送系统。
Scott and I had split up the machine into the front half and the back half; he would design the pieces of the new starting mechanism on the back, and I would design the fuel delivery system on the front of the machine.
然后是电子设备，以便对整个设备进行排序。这涉及组装黑色塑料盒和电子元件。我根据切特的设计将它们组装起来。我在金属板上钻孔，将金属板喷成战舰灰色，将电子元件拧到金属板上，并用电线和焊料将它们连接起来。这个过程让我明白，没有受过教育的人如何在装配线上工作，生产出非常复杂的设备，却不知道自己在做什么。
And then there was the electronics to sequence the whole thing. This involved assembling black plastic boxes and electronic components. I put them together on the basis of Chet's designsI drilled holes into metal plates, spray-painted the plates battleship gray, screwed the electronic components onto the plates, and connected them with wires and solder. The process made me understand how uneducated people can work on assembly lines and produce very complex equipment without having any idea what they are doing.
在机器前端，一个直接目标是构建一个支架，将气缸固定在测试台上的金属槽上。这是一项为期两天的工作；尼克和我切割管道和板材，将其中一块板材安装在机器上，并将四根斜切管道焊接在该板材和测试台上的板材之间。然后我们将整个机器喷成银色。当我们完成后，它看起来非常漂亮，这让我感到惊讶——就像《大众机械》杂志上的东西一样。
On the front end of the machine, one immediate goal was to construct a support to fix the cylinder to the metal slots on the test bed. It was a two-day job; Nick and I cut pipes and plates, set up one of the plates on the machine, and welded the four angle-cut pipes between that plate and the plate on the test bed. Then we spray-painted the whole thing silver. It amazed me how good it looked when we were done-like something in Popular Mechanics.
我的演讲是在咖啡和奶油奶酪丹麦餐休息后进行的。我总结了我们发现的漏洞和我们组装的硬件。
My talk was just after the coffee and cream cheese Danish break. I summarized the leaks we'd detected and the hardware we'd assembled.
卡特彼勒的那个人说：“所以你告诉我们这个东西还没起作用。什么时候才能起作用？我必须回去向我的副总裁汇报，他有点焦躁不安。你知道，罢工和其他事情，资金变得有点短缺，我们可能不得不削减”
The guy from Caterpillar said, "So what you're telling us is the thing doesn't work yet. When is it going to work? I have to go back and report to my vice-president, and he's getting a little antsy. You know, what with the strike and everything, money's been getting a little scarce and we might have to cut the"
海伍德教授出面挽救局面。“嗯，如你所知，这些事情确实需要时间。我们期望在暑假期间取得很大进展，那时我们所有人的课业压力都会减轻，我相信到下次会议时，我们将使所有部件投入运行，并进行一两次试射。”
Professor Heywood stepped in to the rescue. "Well, as you know, these things do take time. We expect to see a lot of progress during the summer when the pressure of classwork is less for all of us, and I'm sure that by the next meeting we will have all the components operational and have a test firing or two."
谢谢您，教授。
Thank you, Professor.
那天下午参观实验室时，卡特彼勒的一位员工说他喜欢尼克和我建造的前部支撑。为他工作可能会很有趣；如果他们不在皮奥里亚就好了。
During the lab tour that afternoon the guy from Caterpillar said he liked the front support Nick and I had built. It could be interesting to work for him; if only they weren't located in Peoria.
那天晚上午夜过后，办公室里只剩下我和安两个人。
That night after midnight, An and I were the only ones left in our offices.
“怎么样？”我问他。
"How's it going?" I asked him.
“哦，还不错，”他说。“不过，情况还可以好一些。医生说我必须停止‘两头烧蜡烛’，但我别无选择。每天我都待在这里直到凌晨 1 点，然后回家陪妻子和孩子，然后 7 点起床送孩子上学，8 点回到实验室。我每周 7 天都在这里，到现在已经两年了。”
"Oh, not too bad," he said. "They could be better, though. My doctor said I have to stop how do you say 'burning the candle from both ends,' but I don't have much choice. Every day it's stay here till 1:00 A.M., then go home to my wife and children, then up at 7:00 to get the children ready for school and back here at the lab by 8:00. Seven days a week I am here for two years so far. "
“好吧，当你晋升为将军、国防部长、总理之后，你就会知道这一切都是值得的，”我说。
"Well, after you work your way up to general and on to defense minister and on to premier, you'll know it was all worthwhile," I said.
“如果我够幸运的话，也许我会成为一名将军。但剩下的就是政治了，你知道，我的朋友，我们是工程师，我们不会撒谎，而政治最适合撒谎的人。看看你们对卡特做了什么。他是一个好人，甚至可能是一个好工程师，一个聪明的人，一个诚实的人，而你们的国家却唾弃他，”他回答道。
"Maybe if I'm lucky I'll be a general. But the rest is politics, and you know, my friend, we are engineers, we do not lie, and politics is best suited for people who lie. Look what you people did to Carter. He was a good man, maybe even a good engineer, an intelligent man, an honest man, and your country spat on him," he answered.
他把一半的博洛尼亚香肠三明治递给我，我坐在他钢灰色办公桌对面的旧绿色 Naugahyde 办公室扶手椅上。
He offered me half of his bologna sandwich and I sat down in the old green Naugahyde office armchair across from his steelgray desk.
我问他：“你睡这么少怎么过得下去？”
"How can you get by on so little sleep?" I asked him.
他回答说：“一般来说，我在以色列值班时，我们每天只睡四个小时。这完全取决于你的习惯。在那里，我们每天只睡四个小时，所以减少到零小时不会有太大影响。你知道托马斯·爱迪生从来不睡觉；他每四到六个小时只打个十五分钟瞌睡。但即使在军队里，每天只睡几个小时，即使在战争期间，也没有什么比这里更艰难的了。六日战争很艰难，但至少只有六天。有时我想知道我是否能活着离开这里。”
He answered, "Typically when I am on duty in Israel we live on four hours sleep. It's all a matter of what you're used to. There we had four hours so it would not be much of a decrease to zero hours. You know your Thomas Edison never slept; he just took fifteen-minute catnaps every four or six hours. But even in the army with the few hours of sleep, even during the wars, nothing there is as hard as this place. The Six Day War was hard, but at least it was only six days. Sometimes I wonder whether I'm going to make it out of here alive."
“坚持住，”我说，“我相信你会做得很好。至少你有天赋和工作能力。我经常怀疑自己是否具备这两点。”
"Hang in there," I said. "I'm sure you'll do fine. At least you've got the talent and the ability to work. I often wonder whether I have either."
“天赋是一种天赋，我的朋友。如果你能在这里待得足够久，工作能力也是你获得的。你会变得像尼希米一样，一手拿着剑，一手拿着铲子，没有什么能让你放弃工作。”
"Talent is a gift, my friend. And the ability to work, if you can stay here long enough, that is something you acquire. You become like Nehemiah, with a sword in one hand and a shovel in the other hand, and nothing is able to bring you down from your work."
7 月 10 日
July 10
我和切特、韦斯特开车前往哈特福德的联合技术研发中心取燃油喷射器。在柴油发动机中，活塞压缩气缸内的空气，并加热空气，就像自行车打气筒一样。压缩结束时，燃油喷射器将燃油喷射到气缸中；然后燃油蒸发并自燃。
Chet, West, and I drove to United Technologies Research and Development Center in Hartford to pick up the fuel injector. In diesel engines, the piston compresses the air in the cylinder, and it heats up the air, just as a bicycle pump does. At the end of the compression, the fuel injector squirts fuel into the cylinder; the fuel then vaporizes and spontaneously ignites.
在研发中心，拥有博士学位的人有自己的小办公室，墙壁是煤渣砖砌成的，办公桌是钢灰色的，就像我在研究所的办公室一样。不过，与我的办公室不同，他们的办公室有窗户，即使不能打开，也是一种不错的设计。他们的办公室围绕着猪圈，所有的下属——新来的人或只有硕士学位的人——都在整齐排列的计算机终端和绘图桌上工作。我突然想到，如果美国工业界需要更好的工程师，为什么不给他们更好的工作条件呢？这样，最聪明的人可能会决定不去商学院或法学院，而去获得私人办公室和体面的薪水。
At the R & D center, the guys with Ph.D.'s had their own little offices with cinderblock walls and steel-gray desks like the one I had at the institute. Unlike my office, though, they had windows, which were a nice touch even if you couldn't open them. Their offices encircled the pigpens, where all the underlings-the newcomers or guys with just master's degrees-worked at computer terminals and drafting tables arranged in neat rows. If American industry wants better engineers, it occurred to me, why don't they give them better working conditions? Then the brightest ones might decide against going to business school or law school to get a private office and a decent salary.
现在，韦斯特几乎完全退出了这一领域；他的公司正在为能源部拨款，准备一份报告，但这份报告最终会被搁置。但他在 UTC 有一个朋友，他有一个备用的 EFIS 燃油喷射器。这就是我们实验时要用到的东西。
West was nearly totally out of the picture now; his company was rolling along with a grant from the Department of Energy for a report that would sit on somebody's shelf. But he had a buddy at UTC who had a spare EFIS fuel injector. That was what we would use for our experiments.
EFIS 代表电子燃油喷射系统，由 UTC 开发，用于提高坦克性能。唯一的问题是，就像为军队开发的许多其他东西一样，它在研究实验室中效果很好，但当技术含量低但可靠的俄罗斯坦克向布列塔尼发起猛烈进攻时，它在战场上却过于复杂，无法很好地发挥作用。
EFIS stands for electronic fuel injection system, which was developed by UTC to improve tank performance. The only problem was that, like many other things developed for the army, it worked great in the research lab but was too complicated to work well in the field when the low-tech-but-reliable Russian tanks stormed toward Brittany.
不过，它非常适合我们的目的，因为在 RCM 中，燃料喷射器每次实验只需点火一次。EFIS 在这方面的表现比任何标准燃料喷射器都要好。
It would suit our purposes well, though, because in the RCM, the fuel injector only had to fire once per experiment. And the EFIS could do this better than any standard fuel injector.
切特、韦斯特和我来到大楼后面的车间。这让我想起了斯隆实验室。我们来到旁边安静的玻璃办公室，见到了领班。他拿起电话，通过公共广播系统说：“乔治·布伦特到办公室。乔治·布伦特到办公室。”领班没有提供更多信息，乔治·布伦特从公共广播系统的语气中知道，现在是解雇通知时间。
Chet, West, and I went to the workshop in the back of the building. It reminded me of the Sloan Lab. We went to the quiet, glass-enclosed office on the side and met the foreman. He picked up the telephone and said over the PA system, "George Brent to the office. George Brent to the office." The foreman gave no further information, and for all George Brent knew from the tone of voice on the PA, it was pink slip time.
“乔治，这些先生来自麻省理工学院，我们需要为他们安装 EFIS 注射器，以便他们进行研究。我希望你能帮帮他们，”领班说道。
"George, these gentlemen here are from MIT, and we need to set them up with an EFIS injector for some research they're doing. I'd like you to help them out," the foreman said.
“我很乐意，先生，”乔治说。乔治是一位友善的中年机械师，灰白的头发向后抹油，脚上穿着黑色的鞋子和白色的袜子；他让我想起了电视剧《莱利的生活》中的莱利。他就像尼克，但更年轻一些。
"I'd be happy to, sir," George said. George was a friendly, middle-aged mechanic, with graying hair greased back, black shoes, and white socks; he reminded me of Riley in the "Life of Riley" TV show. He was like Nick, but younger.
乔治带我们来到他安装在实验台上的 EFIS 喷射器。“你看，这里有个螺线管；那只是一个用电磁铁操作的阀门。所以你要做的就是切断磁铁的电源，然后阀门就会打开，燃料就会从喷射器尖端的小孔中流出。”
George took us to the EFIS injector he'd set up on the lab bench. "See, it's got a solenoid here; that's just a valve that operates with an electromagnet. So what you do is cut the power to the magnet and then the valve opens and the fuel goes out of the tiny holes in the tip of the injector."
他按下开关，一小团带有柴油气味的白气从喷射器尖端喷涌而出。
He flipped a switch and a small white cloud that smelled like diesel fuel burst out from the tip of the injector.
乔治继续解释道：“你知道，我们制造这些东西的方式很有趣。我们制造所有的零件，主要是杆和适合杆的圆柱体，然后我们给工厂里的一些女士一盒杆和一盒圆柱体。她们拿起杆并在圆柱体中测试它们；她们可以通过手指的感觉判断尺寸是否正确。这比将零件加工到万分之一英寸的公差要便宜得多。”
George continued his explanation, "You know, it's interesting how we build these things. We make all the pieces, mostly rods and cylinders that the rods fit in, and then we give some of the ladies in the plant a box of rods and a box of cylinders. They take the rods and test them in the cylinders; they can tell by the feel in their fingers whether or not the dimensions are correct. It's a lot cheaper than machining the parts to a ten-thousandth of an inch tolerance."
高科技。
High technology.
任何人都能有好主意，即使是愚蠢的人。我的好主意是问乔治是否有 EFIS 的备用零件，以及我们要取的完整装置。我没有任何真正的理由要这些垃圾零件；只是觉得如果我手边有它们，我可能就能弄清楚这个东西是如何工作的。我可以玩展示和讲述。我自己玩。
Anybody can have a good idea, even a stupid person. My good idea was to ask George whether he had any spare pieces of the EFIS, together with the complete unit that we'd come to pick up. I didn't have any real reason to ask for the junk pieces; it just seemed that I might be able to figure out how the thing worked if I had them handy. I could play show-and-tell. By myself.
从马萨诸塞州西部开车回来的路上，我坐在后座上睡了一会儿，而切特和韦斯特则在前面聊天。
On the drive back from western Mass., I sat in the backseat and slept some while Chet and West talked in the front.
“你做咨询吗？”韦斯特直截了当地问切特。
"Do you consult?" West asked Chet bluntly.
“是的，有一点。我为资助我论文的人做一些兼职工作，”切特回答道。切特似乎并不在乎钱。他更热衷于科学和理论；他会追随海伍德的脚步。
"Yeah, a little bit. I do some work on the side for the people who funded my thesis," Chet answered. Chet didn't seem to care about money. He was more into the science and the theory of it; he would follow in Heywood's footsteps.
“你们的收费标准是多少？”
"What's your billing rate?"
“每小时五十美元。”
"Fifty dollars an hour."
“他们肯定在嘲笑你，伙计，”韦斯特笑着说。“如果我是你，我至少会出一百美元。他们会付钱的；他们有钱。”
"They must be laughing at you, pal," West chuckled. "If I were you I'd go for at least a hundred. They'll pay it; they've got the bucks."
在 128 号公路的收费站，一辆平板卡车停在我们旁边。车上装载着被撞坏的汽车，外部金属板被剥落，关节和骨架都裸露着。车轴上有一个弹簧，还有一个减震器。底盘看上去像个大块头，就像戴维·米勒的车一样。
At the tollbooth at Route 128 a flatbed truck pulled up beside us. Its cargo was wrecked cars with the exterior sheet metal stripped off; the joints and marrow were bare. There was a spring on an axle, and a dashpot-the shock absorber. The chassis looked like a mass, just like in David Miller's class.
7 月 15 日
July 15
在自助洗衣店，我思考了脱水循环需要多少时间才能将衣服上的水分甩干，以及脱水循环的能量与烘干机的热能相比如何。脱水时间和烘干时间的哪种组合能使总能耗最少？
At the laundromat I pondered how much the spin cycle should run its motor to wring the moisture from my clothes, and how the spin cycle energy compares with the dryer's heat energy. What combination of spin time and dryer time would result in the least total energy use?
我拿起某人留在旁边烘干机上的蓝绿色平装书。封底是一张站在摩托车旁边的男子和男孩的照片。
I picked up the aquamarine paperback that somebody'd left on the next dryer. The back cover was a picture of a man and a boy standing next to a motorcycle.
有两句话格外引人注目。第一句是：“科学方法的步骤包括：（1）问题陈述；（2）关于问题原因的假设；（3）为检验每个假设而设计的实验；（4）实验的预测结果；（5）实验的观察结果；（6）从实验结果中得出结论。”第二句与之类似：“实验绝不会仅仅因为未能达到预期结果而失败。只有当实验未能充分检验相关假设，当实验产生的数据无法证明任何事情时，实验才会失败。”
Two sentences stood out. The first said, "The steps in the scientific method are: (1) statement of the problem; (2) hypotheses as to the cause of the problem; (3) experiments designed to test each hypothesis; (4) predicted results of the experiments; (5) observed results of the experiments; and (6) conclusions from the result of the experiments." The second was like unto it: "An experiment is never a failure solely because it fails to achieve predicted results. An experiment is a failure only when it also fails adequately to test the hypothesis in question, when the data it produces don't prove anything one way or another."
这些陈述明确地概括了切特、韦斯特和海伍德教授试图告诉我的内容。我们测试了这台机器，看它是否能承受更高的压力。答案是否定的，结论是重建机器的部件。斯科特和他的计算机模型将预测实验结果。我们会做实验，我会分析数据，他会得出他的计算机模型需要做哪些改变的结论。
The statements explicitly summed up what Chet, West, and Professor Heywood had implicitly tried to tell me. We had tested the machine to see whether it could take the higher pressure. The answer was no, and the conclusion was to rebuild parts of the machine. Scott and his computer modeling would predict results of the experiments. We would do the experiments, I would analyze the data, and he would conclude what changes were required in his computer model.
这本书是《禅与摩托车维修艺术》。
The book was Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.
8 月 12 日
August 12
我得了 A。大卫也给了我 A。
I got an A. David gave me an A.
我不知道他是否给了每个人 A 的成绩，因为谁知道呢，也许有一天海军某位官员会审查他的拨款申请。
I wondered whether he gave everybody A's, because, who knows, one of the navy guys might review a grant application of his some day.
再过三周，我和 Greene 的未完成成绩就会变成 F，然后我就得开出租车了。
There were three weeks left before my Incomplete with Greene would become an F and I would be driving a cab.
八月天气凉爽，不像往常那样潮湿，待在空调房里用电脑终端感觉很舒服，但这并没有让事情变得更容易。如果不是因为实验室和大卫的课的要求，我可能可以在夏天开始的一两周内完成这个项目。
The fact that August was cool and not its typical humid self, which makes it pleasant to be in an air-conditioned room with a computer terminal, didn't make things any easier. If it hadn't been for the demands of the lab and David's class I probably could have knocked the project off in a week or two at the beginning of the summer.
我记得格林的作业：用实际参数对不可压缩气球填充问题进行编程；例如，典型的气球体积可能是 100 立方英寸，气球内部的压力可能是 2 或 3 psi，典型的拉伸度（弹性）可能接近细橡皮筋的拉伸度。我查看了我设置的方程式——我的模型。
I remembered Greene's assignment: program the incompressible balloon-filling problem with realistic parameters; for example, a typical balloon volume might be 100 cubic inches, pressure on the inside of the balloon might be 2 or 3 psi, and a typical stretchiness (elasticity) might be close to that of a skinny rubber band. I looked at my set-up of the equations-my model.
最要命的是平方项。如果这是一个常微分方程，那么带着解穿越时间将是小菜一碟。如何处理平方项？
The killer is the square term. If it were an ordinary differential equation, marching through time with the solution would be a piece of cake. How to deal with the square term?
解决方案。再去图书馆看看。某个地方的某个人一定曾为此绞尽脑汁。也许伯努利本人也曾试图解决这种方程式，作为梅迪奇或斯福扎基金会的后续资助。
Solution. Go to the library again. Somebody somewhere sometime must have bashed his head up against this. Maybe even Bernoulli himself tried to solve this type of equation as a followon grant from the Medici or Sforza Foundation.
我可以请切特给我一点提示，但那样就是作弊了。但去图书馆不算作弊。如果碰巧有人已经这样做了，我就是自由人了。我穿过 4 号楼四楼的一个大厅，那里有蝙蝠和体操运动员的照片，还有一颗子弹穿过方块 J 的照片，然后来到巴克工程图书馆。在去查看卡片目录之前，我读了漫画和体育新闻，在一张柔软、舒适的皮椅上小睡了一会儿，并查看了我从七年级开始关注的股票价格。我没有持有任何股票，但它表现很好。
I could ask Chet to give me a hint, but that would be cheating. But going to the library is not cheating. If by chance someone has already done this I'll be a free man. I went via a hall on the fourth floor of Building 4 with photographs of bats and gymnasts and a bullet going through a jack of diamonds, and on up to Barker Engineering Library. Before going to the card catalog I read the funnies and the sports, took a nap in one of the soft, cushy, leather chairs, and checked the price of the stock I'd been following since seventh grade. I didn't own any of the stock but it had done very well.
卡片目录很紧凑，几台洗衣机的空间就能装下所有内容，比人文图书馆的卡片目录还要小。
The card catalog was compact; it all fit within the space of several washing machines. It was smaller than the card catalog in the humanities library.
好的。我们先从“气球”开始。也许有人写过一篇关于它的论文或一本书。让我们看看。弹道导弹；弹道学，外部；我们开始：气球。
Okay. Let's start with "balloon." Maybe someone's done a thesis or written a book about it. Let's see. Ballistic missiles; ballistics, exterior; here we go: balloon.
“软性主动脉内球囊充气的二维模型。”“闭塞性充盈问题——见心脏。”“限制性流体环境中的球囊行为。”所有这些报告都在谈论心脏。我不关心心脏；我需要了解真正的气球。
"A 2-Dimensional Model for the Inflation of a Limp Intra- aortic Balloon." "The Occlusive Filling Problem-see Heart." "Balloon Behavior in Restrictive Fluid Environments." All these reports are talking about hearts. I don't care about hearts; I need to know about real balloons.
下一步。也许它在一本热力学书中。在 T 下查找。“热污染”。“热核装置”。“热力学”。这里有一本有趣的书：卡诺的《关于热的动力和适合开发这种动力的机器的思考》。卡诺是十九世纪吉夫托普洛斯一直谈论的法国人。尽管电气工程（课程六，双 E）现在是学院的热门话题，但如果没有卡诺和狄塞尔这样的机械 E，双 E 就无处可去，他们让轴转动发电机。大多数热力学书籍都有相同的呼号，所以我会在那部分书架上扎营。
Next step. Maybe it's in a thermo book. Look under T. "Thermal Pollution." "Thermonuclear Devices." "Thermodynamics." Here's an interesting one: "Reflections on the Motive Power of Heat and on Machines Fitted to Develop This Power," by Carnot. Carnot was the nineteenth-century Frenchman Gyftopoulos always talked about. Even though Electrical Engineering, Course Six, double E, is the hot topic at the institute now, the double E's would be nowhere if it weren't for the mech E's like Carnot and Diesel, who made the shafts turn the generators. Most of the thermo books had the same call letters so I'd camp out in that section of the stacks.
气球问题涉及“非线性微分方程”，所以我还记下了该部分的呼号。为了保险起见，我还查了“流体力学”。上到七楼。
The balloon problem involves "Differential Equations, Nonlinear," so I also wrote down the call letters for that section. And just for good measure, I looked up "Fluid Mechanics." On to the seventh floor.
巴克尔的形状像一个大甜甜圈。甜甜圈洞是位于中心的圆顶空间，你可以在那里阅读漫画，在皮椅上睡觉。油炸面团是书架内缘半径较大的圆形走廊。你可以沿着环路行走，几乎感觉不到自己在转弯，最后回到起点。但如果你保持警惕，每圈结束时你都会有所不同。
Barker is shaped like a big doughnut. The doughnut hole is the domed space in the center where you read the funnies and sleep in the leather chairs. The fried dough is the large-radius circular hallway on the inner edge of the stacks. You can walk the loop, almost not perceiving that you're turning, and end up where you started. But if you're alert you're different at the end of every lap.
微分方程和数值分析技术书籍毫无用处。它们全都是一堆毫无生气的希腊字母，如 sigma 和下标，如 i。我记得比利时的科尔曼教授告诉我，“数学家写出一个非常长且复杂的问题解决方案，例如，一两百个逻辑或代数步骤。然后他或她将其浓缩为数学简写，包括所有希腊字母、下标和上标，并以其他人无法理解的形式发布。”这就是为什么我既不是数学家也不是物理学家。
Differential equations and numerical analysis techniques books were useless. They all were a bunch of lifeless Greek letters like sigma and subscripts like i. I remembered Professor Kollman in Belgium telling me that a "mathematician writes out an extremely long and complicated solution to a problem, with, say, one or two hundred logical or algebraic steps. Then he or she condenses it into the shorthand of mathematics with all its Greek letters and subscripts and superscripts, and publishes it in a form that no one else can understand." That was why I was neither a mathematician nor a physicist.
在甜甜圈里，我感觉自己和伯努利、牛顿在参加一场精神马拉松。好吧，他们的英里跑时间不到五分钟，而我的英里跑时间超过十分钟，但这仍然是同一场赛跑。人群是一样的，痛苦是一样的，也许我们所有人都能到达终点线。我的优势是图书馆和拥挤的场地。
In the doughnut I felt I was in the same mental marathon with Bernoulli and Newton. OK, their mile times are under five minutes and mine are over ten minutes, but it's still the same race. The crowd is the same and the pain is the same and maybe all of us will make it to the finish line. I had the advantage of a library and packed ground before me.
下一站。流体课本。又没用了。许多课本看上去和数学课本一样晦涩难懂——有很多下标。
Next stop. Fluids texts. Useless again. Many looked as obscure as the mathematics texts-lots of subscripts.
最后一站。热力学。除一篇教材外，其他内容相同：《实用热力学》，出版于英国。它没有解决问题，但有一个问题很接近。其中一个例子是：“工业中常见的一个问题是从另一个容器中向小罐中注水，而大容器的压力假定不会因该过程而变化。从液体或气体管道中抽出流体就是这种过程的一个真实例子。”所以当格林给我这个问题时，他知道自己在做什么。
Last stop. Thermo. Ditto except for one text: "Practical Thermodynamics," published in England. It didn't solve the problem, but it had one that was close. One example stated, "A common problem in industry is filling a small tank from another vessel in which the pressure of the larger vessel is assumed not to vary as a result of the process. Tapping fluid off a pipeline of liquid or gas is a real-world example of such a process." So Greene knew what he was doing when he gave me this problem.
除此之外，图书馆是一条死胡同，但我还是学到了东西。每个领域的教科书在索引部分都有几乎相同的条目。呈现顺序各不相同，但在给定领域内，每本书或多或少都讲了同样的事情。知识集是有限的，可管理的。这就是 Barker 卡片目录如此之小的原因。
Other than that the library was a dead end, but I still learned. Each field's textbooks had nearly identical entries in their index sections. The presentation order varied, but within a given field each book said more or less the same thing. The set of knowledge is finite, manageable. That's why the Barker card catalog is so small.
那天晚上我的自行车轮胎爆了，所以我坐公交车回了奥尔斯顿。我记下了在图书馆里浏览时浮现在我脑海中的想法。
My bicycle tire was flat that evening so I took the bus home to Allston. I jotted notes, thoughts that had come to me while I looked through the library.
我回顾了以下方程式：
I reviewed the equations:
气球壳上的力平衡；气球内流动的伯努利方程；从油箱到气球的流动连续性。
The force balance on the balloon shell; Bernoulli's equation for the flow into the balloon; Flow continuity from the tank to the balloon.
我按照格林的建议核对了问题的常数。这些常数将伴随分析，之后它们可能会发生变化。现在的诀窍是让方程流畅起来。
I checked off the problem's constants, as Greene had suggested. These will go along for the ride in the analysis, and later on they can vary. The trick now is to make the equations flow.
想想看。如果我能解出气球外皮的速度方程（“dx 乘以 dt，或 xdot”），我就可以将 d 乘以 dt，再乘以一点 dt，然后找到外皮的新位置。在我的平衡气压和气球弹性的方程中，新的外皮位置会给我一个新的气球压力，这反过来又会给我一个新的外皮速度，这反过来又会给我一个新的外皮位置，这反过来又会给我一个新的气球压力，等等，等等，等等，直到气球破裂或气球中的压力等于罐中的压力。
Think. If I can solve my equation for the speed ("dx by dt, or xdot") of the skin of the balloon, I can multiply that d by dt by a little dt and find a new position of the skin. In my equation that balances the air pressure force with the balloon elasticity, a new skin position will give me a new balloon pressure, which will in turn give me a new skin speed, which will in turn give me a new skin position, which will in turn give me a new balloon pressure, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, until the balloon breaks or the pressure in the balloon equals the pressure in the tank.
在大一微积分课上，诀窍是将长而弯曲的线变成短而直的线。我想用小段时间绘制 x（气球位置）与 t（时间）的关系图。
In freshman calculus the trick was to take long, curvy lines and make them into short, straight lines. I want to graph x, the balloon position, versus t, time, using little slices of time.
我重新绘制了我记得的微积分图画。
I redrew the picture I remembered from calculus.
我可以调用 NextX = x 加 dx/dt * dt。
I could call NextX = x plus dx/dt * dt.
是时候编写软件了。
Time to write the software.
Apple 手册解释了“for”和“next”循环。这是计算机如何“重复”解决问题的核心。
The Apple handbook explained a "for" and "next" loop. This is the heart of how a computer solves things "repeatedly."
我将创建一个索引，称之为 I，它是 t（时间）的替代品。时间只是一个占位符、一个参考标记、图表上的一个标记。要是能多一些就好了。
I'll create an index, call it I, that's a substitute for t, time. Time is just a place holder, a reference mark, a hash mark on a graph. If only there were more of it.
我会说“对于 I = 1 到 100”，就好像我想跟踪气球 100 个 1 秒间隔。在每一秒的开始，我会计算气球外壳的速度。我会将该速度乘以 1 秒，以找出气球在那一秒钟内飞了多远。这样我就能知道下一个位置了。我现在可以尝试解决方案了。
I'll say "for I = 1 to 100," as if I want to track the balloon for 100 1-second intervals. At the beginning of each second, I'll calculate the speed of the shell of the balloon. I'll multiply that speed by 1 second to find how far the balloon goes in that second. That will give me the next position. I can taste the solution now.
最后一个问题。我该如何告诉计算机我希望时间增量始终为 1。如果我现在处于第 43 秒，我怎么知道应该乘以 1 而不是 43？这肯定是有窍门的。
One last problem. How do I tell the computer that I want the time increment always to be 1. If I'm at second number 43, how do I know to multiply by 1 and not 43? There's got to be a trick.
有个窍门。在每一步中，定义一个最后一步。例如，如果我在第 43 步，最后一步将是 42。步长将始终为 1。在程序中，我将把最后一步称为“last!”（计算机术语中的“last I”），程序将从 last! 等于零开始。我将通过编程计算气球压力、膨胀速度和气球的新尺寸 (x)
There is a trick. At each step, define a last step. For example, if I'm at step 43, the last step will be 42. The step size will always be one. In the program I'll call the last step "last!" (computerese for "last I"), and the program will start with last! equal to zero. I'll calculate the balloon pressure, the speed of expansion, and the new size of the balloon (x) by programming
然后我将使当前的 I (1) 等于最后一个 I，这样当我继续计算下一个 1 (2) 时，我将通过从当前的 1 (2) 中减去最后一个 I (1) 得到 1。Apple 的程序如下：
Then I'll make the present I (1) equal to the last I, so when I go on to the next 1 (2), I'll get 1 by subtracting the last I (1) from the present 1 (2). The program for the Apple will be:
很简单。我怎么花了这么长时间才找到解决方案？
It's so simple. How did it take so long for me to arrive at the solution?
我看着车窗外。我在车上过了站后又行驶了三英里，车子在沃特敦广场掉头。空间和时间在思绪中崩塌。
I looked out the window of the bus. I'd stayed on it for three miles past my stop, and it was turning around at Watertown Square. Space and time had collapsed in thought.
8 月 25 日
August 25
我向格林展示了我的解决方案，他说：“没问题。如果你现在停下来，我就给你 B 级。但是，如果你想要 A 级，我再给你一周时间，你可以更改模型以适应气球外壳有质量的情况。”
I showed my solution to Greene and he said, "That's fine. I'll give you a B if you stop now. If you want an A, though, I'll give you another week, and you can change the model to accommodate the case where the skin of the balloon has mass."
没问题。我对程序做了些许改动，四天后把解决方案留在了他的桌子上。
No problemo. I made a slight change to the program and left the solution on his desk four days later.
9 月 2 日
September 2
我在研究所里穿着我的，或者说唐的实验室外套。这让我觉得自己是这里的一部分。新来者惊恐的表情进一步增强了我的信心。我冲上楼梯，来到格林的办公室，拿到了我的 A 级成绩。
I wore my, or rather Don's, lab jacket around the institute. It made me feel a part of the place. The scared faces of the newcomers further fed my confidence. I bolted up the stairs to Greene's office to receive my A.
格林的秘书体重增加了三十磅，也许四十磅，她来回摇动着一根绳子上的秒表，以防止自己跑到 6 号楼的机器那里去拿一包骆驼牌香烟。
Greene's secretary had put on thirty, maybe forty pounds, and she bobbed a stopwatch on a string back and forth to prevent herself from running down to the machine in Building 6 to get a pack of Camels.
她拿出了我的文件。“你的成绩是 B。”她说。
She pulled out my file. "You got a B," she said.
那条蛇。我做了额外的工作，但他还是给了我 B。如果他给了我 A，那么 A 就会抵消我第一学期的平均绩点 (GPA) 中的一个 C。我不在乎他有多少高层联系人。我们达成了协议，但他却反悔了。
That snake. I did the extra work and he gave me a B anyway. If he'd given me an A, the A would have canceled out one of the C's from the first term on my grade point average (GPA). I don't care how many high-level contacts he has. We made a deal and he was backing out of it.
“他现在在家吗？”我问。
"Is he in now?" I asked.
“是的，你想见见他吗？”
"Yes, would you like to see him?"
“是的，马上。”
"Yes. Right away."
我走了进去。他正坐在办公桌前，戴着眼镜，阅读美国国家工程院会议纪要。他站起来迎接我。
I went in. He was sitting at his desk, glasses on, reading proceedings from a meeting of the National Academy of Engineering. He stood up to greet me.
“你为什么给我 B？我以为我们已经达成一致了。”
"Why'd you give me a B? I thought we had an agreement."
我们俩都站着，分别站在他的办公桌的两侧。
We both stood still, on opposite sides of his desk.
“是的，我们确实这么做了，但最后，尽管你为解决这个问题的附加部分付出了很大努力，但你提交的论文，嗯，它并没有达到我凭良心称之为‘A’级作品的水平。我可以让你看看我给过 A 级的一些学期项目的副本，我想你会同意的。”
"Yes, we did, but in the end, even though you made a good effort at solving the additional piece of the problem, the write-up you submitted, well, it just didn't have the polish of what I could in good conscience call 'A' work. I could let you look at copies of some term projects I've given A's on, and I think you'd agree."
“但你为什么不告诉我，给我一个机会做更多的工作来解决这个问题？”
"But why didn't you tell me, give me a chance to do more work, to fix it?"
“好吧，到了一定时候，你不得不结束一个项目。你的工作做得很好，只是没有达到 A 级。我相信，只得一个 B 级不会使你的平均绩点下降那么多，”他说。他一定以为我大部分成绩都是 A 级。他以一种令人费解的方式给了我一张信任票。
"Well, there comes a time when you just have to close the books on a project. You've done good work, just not A work. I'm sure just one B won't bring your grade point average down that much," he said. He must have thought I had mostly A's. In a convoluted way he'd just given me a vote of confidence.
“是啊，不过这也没什么用。也许你是对的。是时候止损并继续前进了。”
"Yeah, well, it won't help that much either. Maybe you're right. It's time to cut my losses and press on."
我已结束缓刑。
I'm off probation.
我属于这里。
I belong here.
章节
C H A P T E R
11
11
西格玛三角洲
Sigma Delta
日程：
Schedule:
1982 年秋季：2.70 设计概论（威尔逊）
Fall '82: 2.70 Introduction to Design (Wilson)
2.14 反馈控制系统（布鲁克斯）
2.14 Feedback Control Systems (Brooks)
2.996 论文
2.996 Thesis
9 月 3 日
September 3
“您是佩珀·怀特吗？”电话另一端的声音说道。“我是学生事务主任办公室打来的。高年级宿舍刚刚有家教空缺。您有兴趣和宿舍长面谈一下吗？”
"Is this Pepper White?" the voice at the other end of the phone said. "I'm calling from the Dean of Student Affairs' office. An opening for a tutor has just come up, at Senior House. Would you be interested in interviewing with the housemaster?"
“当然可以。我需要做什么？”
"Sure. What do I have to do?"
“只要给高级宿舍的多尔西教授打电话就可以了，他的电话号码就在电话簿上。你可以和他预约时间。”
"Just call Professor Dorsey at Senior House; his number's in the directory. You can set up an appointment with him."
是的，宝贝。也许还是有机会获得导师职位的。麻省理工学院的导师就是州立学校所说的 RA（住宿助理的简称），哈佛大学则称之为宿舍研究员，因为哈佛喜欢给人们起听起来很重要的名字。
Yeah baby. Maybe there's a chance for a tutor position after all. A tutor at MIT is what state schools call an R.A., short for resident assistant, and what Harvard calls a house fellow, because Harvard likes to give important sounding names to people.
在春季的骑行间隙，我申请了几所本科生宿舍的导师职位：麦格雷戈宿舍，那里的导师套房可以俯瞰波士顿的美景；麦考密克宿舍，那是一所全女生宿舍，原教旨主义家庭把他们的女儿送来这里（“嘿，也许他们的男朋友需要心理咨询，”我对舍监说）；还有贝克斯利宿舍，那是一所迷幻摇滚宿舍，与 7 号楼隔着马萨诸塞大道。有传言说，贝克斯利的化学专业学生合成了自己的迷幻药，而联邦调查局正急于破获此事。在贝克斯利，我进入了导师淘汰的第一轮。
In the springtime between bicycle rides I'd applied for tutor positions at several undergraduate dormitories: at MacGregor, where the tutor suites have million-dollar views of Boston; at McCormick, the all-women dorm where the fundamentalist families send their daughters ("Hey, maybe their boyfriends need counseling," I said to the housemaster); and at Bexley, the acid rock dorm across Mass. Ave. from Building 7. At Bexley, rumor had it, the chem majors synthesized their own LSD, and the FBI was just aching to make a bust. At Bexley, I made it to the first round of tutor elimination.
4 月 1 日
April 1
面试由十二名辅导员候选人组成，他们坐在宿舍长雅各布·莱维教授夫妇的客厅里。如果候选人和我的想法一样，那么如果其他十一位候选人在马萨诸塞大道人行横道上被自卸卡车撞倒，他们都不会感到失望。一百名贝克斯利人中大约有三十人问了一些一般性问题。作为候选人，我们的工作就是在我们自己选择的适当时间顺利、巧妙地回答问题。
The interview consisted of the twelve tutor candidates sitting around the living room of the housemasters, Professor and Mrs. Jacob Levy. None of the candidates, if they thought like me, would be very disappointed if the other eleven were run over by a dumptruck at the Mass Ave. crosswalk. About thirty of the one hundred Bexleyites asked general questions. Our job as candidates was smoothly, deftly, to answer a question at an appropriate time of our own choosing.
穿着齐柏林飞船乐队 T 恤的孩子提出了一个问题：“那么，如果我吸食了毒品，然后你找到了我，你会怎么做？”
The kid wearing the Led Zeppelin T-shirt posed the question, "So, like, if I were on a bad acid trip, like, and if you found me, like, what would you do?"
现在似乎是我开口说话的好时机。“好吧，你的事就是你的事；我的意思是，如果你想把你那天才的大脑炸掉，那就去吧。我会叫救护车把你送到医院，他们会照顾你，也许会帮你洗胃，防止你伤害自己。至于我自己，我已经八年没吃过阿司匹林了，我一直很健康，很快乐。”
It seemed as good a time as any for me to speak up. "Well, your business is your business; I mean if you want to fry your highly gifted brain out, go ahead. I'll call an ambulance and get you to a hospital where they can take care of you, maybe pump your stomach out, and keep you from hurting yourself. As for myself, I haven't taken so much as an aspirin for about eight years, and I've been fairly healthy and happy."
蜂鸣器响。答案错误。
Buzzer sound. Wrong answer.
坐在我旁边的生物化学专业学生，留着较长的头发和胡子，距离目标更近一些。
The biochem major sitting next to me, with longish hair, beard, and mustache, hit the mark a little closer.
“好吧，我尝试过各种消遣性药物，我有一个笔记本，上面写满了药方，对你们来说可能有用，呵呵。至于迷幻药的场景，我想劝你冷静下来，就像我曾经劝我的朋友那样。我会说，‘没关系，你正在走向跑道，你不会摔倒的，伙计，轻轻地用棍子，平稳地走，我们会把你弄下来的，就这样，我们走了，没事的。’我会一直说这样的话，直到你冷静下来。”
"Well, I've done about every kind of recreational pharmaceutical there is, and I've got a notebook full of recipes, which might come in handy for you guys, heh heh. As far as the acid trip scene, I'd like talk you down like I once did for a friend of mine. I'd say something like, 'It's OK, you're coming to the runway, you're not going to crash and bum, man, just go easy with the stick, nice and smooth, we'll get you down, that's it here we go it's all right.' I'd say something like that until you came down off it."
蜂鸣器响。答案正确。
Buzzer sound. Right answer.
9月3日
September 3 again
我和多尔西教授的约会时间是七点，我从马萨诸塞大道沿着查尔斯河走到了高级住宅，沿途风景优美。傍晚阳光下的帆船和背景中波士顿天际线的现实让我回想起前一年，那时我还是个技术新手。我知道我已经进步了。现在，只要我能说服自己成为一名导师，我就能还清债务了。
My appointment with Professor Dorsey was at seven and I took the scenic route to Senior House-down the Charles from Mass. Ave. The sailboats in the late evening sun and the real world of Boston's skyline in the background made me think back to the year before, when I was a technological infant. I'd gotten better; I knew it. Now if I could just talk my way into being a tutor I'd be able to pay my debts.
空气中有一丝寒意，这让我想起了布鲁塞尔的秋天，还有斯蒂芬妮。自 12 月以来，我没有给她打过电话或写过信，她也没有。布鲁日的事已经过去了。我不知道她是否找到了其他人。
There was a little chill in the air, and it made me remember the fall in Brussels, and Stephanie. I hadn't called or written since December, and neither had she. Water under the bridge in Bruges. I wondered whether she'd found someone else.
高级宿舍的基石上刻着“1917”。1917 年，我外祖父横跨佛兰德斯前往巴黎。穿过玻璃入口，进入被 L 形宿舍和格雷校长后院的围墙包围的庭院，吉米·亨德里克斯在四楼窗户外的扬声器上大声播放着“紫雾”。
Into Senior House's cornerstone was chiseled "1917." In 1917 my mother's father marched across Flanders to Paris. Past the glass entryway to the courtyard enveloped by the L-shaped dormitory and the wall of President Gray's backyard, Jimi Hendrix played "Purple Haze" loudly on speakers pointed out of a fourth-floor window.
格雷总统花园的树荫使黄昏渐渐降临，天色渐暗，而前方高树下的庭院里篝火的光芒使夜色渐亮。一个长发满脸痘痘的小孩朝艾姆斯街走去，他穿着黑色 T 恤，上面写着“去地狱看看”，下面是 7 号楼的火焰图案。我打了个招呼。
The fast-falling dusk was made darker from the shade of the trees in President Gray's garden, lighter by the light of the bonfire ahead in the courtyard under the tall tree. A kid with long hair and lots of zits and a black T-shirt with "Visit Hell" written underneath a flaming design of Building 7 walked past toward Ames Street. I said hello.
他没有回应，没有点头，没有发出声音，没有承认我的存在。
He returned no response, no nod, no noise, no acknowledgment of my existence.
两个手挽手走着的女人也没有理会我的问候。
Two women walking arm in arm also ignored my greeting.
一个扎着马尾辫、戴着耳环、穿着一些印度男人穿的、我们美国人称之为裙子的衣服的高个子男人打招呼。我没有打招呼。
A tall guy wearing a ponytail, an earring, and a garment that is wom by some Indian men but we in America call a skirt said hello. I didn't say hello.
在四楼窗户附近，扬声器里播放着亨德里克斯的音乐，阳台上挂着玛丽的“运动死亡”T 恤的超大版。骷髅、星条旗，以及骷髅牙齿上的“只有生命才能杀死你”字样，在篝火的微风中轻轻摇曳。我觉得这个地方比贝克斯利还要糟糕。
Near the fourth-floor window, where the speakers played Hendrix, the larger-than-life version of Mary's "Sport Death" T-shirt hung from the balcony. The skull, the stars and stripes, the "Only life can kill you" in the skull's teeth, waved gently in the bonfire's breeze. This place is even worse than Bexley, I thought.
另一个扎着马尾辫的家伙在轮胎秋千上绕着树旋转。他弓起后背，水平地离开轮胎，离心力将他的马尾辫向外推，他与篝火擦肩而过，头也从未靠近过树；他是一个带有微处理器的系绳球。他可能已经在电脑上计算过他的轨迹，并且确切地知道他的误差幅度是多少。
Another guy with a ponytail spun around the tree from the tire swing. He arched his back horizontally outward from the tire, and the centrifugal force thrust his ponytail outward as he missed the bonfire by a hair's breadth and his head never came near the tree; he was a tetherball with an on-board microprocessor. He'd probably calculated his trajectory on his computer and knew precisely what his margin for error was.
“是的，死亡运动！”篝火旁的一位旁观者说道。运动是一种命令——反抗、嘲弄。这位旁观者穿着一件黄色 T 恤，上面写着“敢于友好”，我向他询问去多尔西家公寓的路线。
"Yeah, Sport Death!" one of the bonfire bystanders said. Sport was a command-to defy, to taunt. The bystander wore a yellow T-shirt that said, "Dare to be friendly," and I asked him for directions to the Dorseys' apartment.
“当然可以，就在左边，朝着河流的地方，克拉夫茨百货公司的二楼，”他愉快地说道。
"Sure, it's right down there on the left toward the river, on the second floor of Crafts," he said with a happy tone to his voice.
我和多尔西教授坐了下来，他向我解释了情况。“嗯，你知道，阿特金森的导师当时正在澳大利亚内陆进行基因工程研究，为怀特黑德研究所的论文工作做准备，他在那里感染了一种奇怪的疾病，目前在悉尼的一家医院接受观察。”
I sat down with Professor Dorsey and he explained the situation. "Well, you see, the Atkinson tutor was off doing some genetic engineering research in the Australian outback for his thesis work at the Whitehead institute, and he contracted some strange disease out there and is under observation in a hospital in Sydney."
“哎呀，太可怕了；我希望他能康复。”但不会很快。
"Gee, that's terrible; I hope he recovers." But not real soon.
多尔西教授继续说道：“新生入学周马上就要到了，除了少数学生，其他学生都还没回来。通常情况下，这是一个相当疯狂的时期，为了避免整个学校陷入混乱，我认为我们真的需要全员的辅导。”
Professor Dorsey continued, "Freshman rush week is coming right up, and the students aren't back yet except for a few. Typically, it's a pretty wild time, and to keep the whole place from blowing up, I think we really need our full complement of tutors."
“我以为这里全是老年人，所以他们才叫这里是老年人之家？”我问道。
"I thought it was all seniors; isn't that why they call it Senior House?" I asked.
“不，这是高年级宿舍，学院里最古老的宿舍。这里上课，也有一些研究生。在招生周，问题的一部分是这个地方通常是新生的最后选择——通常是这里和贝克斯利之间的平局。没有人想住在这里；他们宁愿住在更中庸的宿舍，比如河上游的麦格雷戈和新宿舍，或者兄弟会；甚至有人说要关闭高年级宿舍。所以我们真的希望有尽可能多的导师在场，只是为了关注事情，并为迷路的新生提供友好的面孔。”
"No, it's the senior house, the oldest dorm in the institute. There are all classes here, and also some graduate students. Part of the issue for rush week is that this place is usually the freshmen's last choice-it's generally a tie between here and Bexley. Nobody wants to live here; they'd rather live at the more middle-of-the road dorms like Macgregor and New House up the river, or at the frats; there's even been talk about shutting down Senior House as a dorm. So we'd really like to have as many tutors on hand as possible, just to keep an eye on things and to be a friendly face for the lost freshmen."
“我想我能应付，”我说。“你还采访其他人吗？”
"I think I could handle that," I said. "Are you interviewing anyone else?"
“嗯，你是第一个打电话的人，今天院长办公室没能联系到其他人。你看起来是个不错的人；我想你会没事的。不过，我只想问你一个问题。你在哪里上的高中？”
"Well, you're the first person who's called, and the dean's office wasn't able to reach anyone else today. You seem like a nice enough person; I think you'd be fine. I'd just like to ask one question of you, though. Where'd you go to high school?"
我觉得这个问题有点奇怪。我回答道：“华盛顿特区温斯顿丘吉尔高中。”
Kind of an odd question, I thought. "Winston Churchill High School, in the Washington, D.C., area," I answered.
“很好。这下我松了一口气。你穿着蓝白条纹衬衫，卡其裤，还有上衣，我还以为你是预科生呢。我觉得预科生在这里不会过得很好。你什么时候可以搬进来？”
"Good. That's a relief. What with the blue and white striped shirt you're wearing, and the khaki pants, and the topsiders, I was afraid you might be a preppy. I don't think a preppy would get along well here. When can you move in?"
“明天，”我说道，想到即将离开奥尔斯顿的倾斜公寓，心里很高兴。
"Tomorrow," I said, happy at the prospect of leaving my sloping tenement in Allston.
“太好了，”他说。“现在让我简单总结一下你作为导师的职责。首先，这个术语几乎是一个误称，因为坦率地说，本科生通常比研究生更聪明，除了本科毕业的学生和从加州理工学院毕业的学生。此外，有朋友的学生往往会互相辅导，或者他们会得到上一学期上过课的人的帮助。作为导师，你的主要目的是让宿舍环境更人性化一点，并站在第一线，了解是否有人有情绪问题，”他说。
"That's great," he said. "Now let me briefly summarize your duties as a tutor. First of all, the term is pretty much a misnomer because, well, frankly the undergrads are generally smarter than the graduate students, except for the ones who went here as undergrads and the ones who came here from Cal Tech. Besides, the students who have friends tend to tutor one another, or they get help from someone who took whatever class it is the previous semester. Your main purpose as a tutor is to make the environment in the dorm a little more human, and to be on the front line of knowing whether anyone is having emotional problems," he said.
“嗯。”
"Uh huh."
“你看，我们现在处境很尴尬；一方面，本科生据称是成年人，享有正常社会的所有自由。另一方面，许多本科生在高中的计算机室里消磨业余时间，因此他们没有机会发展社交能力。上帝知道他们在这里没有时间发展社交能力。所以，如果他们中的一个在隆冬时节越过栏杆穿过冰面，他的父母很可能会起诉学院。你的部分工作是帮助我们防止这种情况发生。哦，顺便说一句，我们希望你每两周举办一次学习休息，每学期你将被要求举办一次全院学习休息。”
"You see, we're in a sticky position here; on the one hand the undergraduates are allegedly adults and are accorded all the freedoms of normal society. On the other hand, many of the undergraduates spent their spare time in the computer room at their high schools so they didn't really have a chance to develop socially. And Lord knows there's no time for them to develop socially here. So if one of them goes over the railing and through the ice in the dead of winter, there's a good chance that his parents will sue the institute for all it's worth. Part of your job is to help us prevent that from happening. Oh, and by the way, we'd like you to host a study break every two weeks, and once each term you'll be required to host a whole-house study break."
也就是说，每学期有七次学习休息时间，比如说，一个小时用来买牛奶和饼干，一个小时用来学习休息，一个小时用来打扫卫生。一共有二十一个小时。现在算一下，每学期有五个小时的自杀预防工作，加上两三个小时的实际辅导，偶尔还有一次导师会议，我每学期的实际工作时间大约是三十个小时，乘以两个学期等于六十个小时。房租大概是每月 250 美元，或者每年 3000 美元，再加上一千美元的伙食费，一共是 4000 美元，除以六十大约是每小时 65 美元，免税，所以税前大约是每小时一百美元。这几乎和一些教授做咨询的收入一样多——多划算啊。
That makes, call it seven study breaks per term, at, say, one hour to get the milk and cookies, one hour for the study break itself, and one hour to clean up. That's twenty-one hours. Now figure five hours per term of suicide prevention duty, plus two or three hours of actual tutoring, an occasional tutor's meeting, and I'm up to about thirty hours per term of actual work, times two terms equals sixty hours. The rent's probably worth about $250 a month, or $3K a year, plus another thousand for food, that comes to $4K, divided by sixty is roughly $65 bucks an hour, tax-free, so before taxes that would be about a hundred an hour. That's almost as much as some of the profs make consulting-what a deal.
“你想让我带你参观一下宿舍吗？”他问道。
"Would you like me to give you a tour of the dorm?" he asked.
“当然，听起来很棒。”
"Sure, that sounds great."
我们再次走过篝火旁，从朗克尔入口开始。入口是高级宿舍的一个子集，有单独的入口、楼梯和走廊。约翰·朗克尔是麻省理工学院的早期校长，他对教育的主要贡献是高中“车间”课程。我问多尔西教授，他是否知道“运动死亡”一词的来源。
We walked past the bonfire again and started with the Runkle entry. An entry is a subset of Senior House, with a separate entrance and stairway and hallways. John Runkle was an early president of MIT, whose major contribution to education was high school "shop" class. I asked Professor Dorsey whether he had any clues as to where "Sport Death" came from.
“我不知道；这只是这里的一种战斗口号。有一个故事说，一名高年级学生正在上跳伞课，但他的降落伞没有打开。那应该是‘运动死亡’的终极表现。我试图核实这件事，但找不到任何关于这个故事的记录。另一个可能更合理的解释是，第一幅画，位于 Runkle 第四街，是由一个孩子画的，他的室友是第一个在越南被杀的麻省理工学院学生。”
"I don't know; it's just sort of a battle cry around here. One story has it that a Senior House student was taking skydiving lessons and his chute didn't open. That was supposed to be the ultimate in 'sporting death.' I tried to check that out and couldn't find any documentation on the story, though. Another, maybe more plausible explanation is that the first painting, here on Runkle fourth, was done by a kid whose roommate was the first MIT student killed in Vietnam."
奇怪的是，传统有了自己的生命，而当你深入研究它时，没有人知道它们意味着什么。
It's odd how traditions take on a life of their own and when you get right down to it nobody knows what they mean.
我们沿着朗克尔街四号走去，门外传来亨德里克斯的音乐，声音最大。嘿，乔，你手里拿着枪要去哪儿……
We walked down the length of Runkle fourth, with the Hendrix music at its loudest through the open door to the speakers. Hey Joe, where you goin' with that gun in your hand ...
“这是原作，”多尔西教授指着骷髅壁画说道。“我带你去看看走廊那边的蒙克复制品。他们叫它尼摩船长。”
"Here's the original," Professor Dorsey said, pointing to the skull mural. "Let me show you the Munch reproduction down the hall. They call it Captain Nemo."
它同样比真人还大——尖叫声，痛苦的面孔。我很高兴朗克尔没有在我的参赛作品中排第四。多尔西教授带我去了阿特金森，在二楼的楼梯平台上，一个身材高大、看上去运动健壮的学生口述了一封信：“我的计算人员将能够在两个人月内完成这项任务。此致，DLM。”
It was equally larger than life-The Scream, the face of anguish. I was glad Runkle fourth was not in my entry. Professor Dorsey led me to Atkinson, and on the second floor landing, a tall athleticlooking student dictated a letter: "And my computing staff will be able to complete the task within two man-months. Yours sincerely, DLM."
“黛安娜，这是佩珀·怀特，”多尔西教授说道。“他将接替纳比尔担任阿特金森的导师。”
"Dianne, this is Pepper White," Professor Dorsey said. "He'll be replacing Nabil as the Atkinson tutor."
黛安娜冷笑了一下，似乎在想：“你们到底想干什么？你们为什么要绕过民主程序？”我希望她的冷笑不是阿特金森人冷笑的预兆。最好是尽量保持友好，以防万一。
Dianne sneered a little, as if she thought, "What are you guys trying to pull? Why are you bypassing the democratic process?" I hoped that her sneer wasn't an indicator of sneers to come from the people in Atkinson. Best to nip this in the bud by trying to be friendly.
我问她：“这封信是写给谁的？你要开公司吗？”
I asked her, "Who's the letter to? Are you starting a company?"
“我从九年级开始就从事计算机咨询工作，”她不耐烦地说道。“我在 Senior House 有大约 8 名分包商，我负责营销和客户服务。”
"I've been in computer consulting since ninth grade," she said impatiently. "I've got a staff of about eight subcontractors here in Senior House, and I provide the marketing and client servicing."
“天哪，这真是太令人印象深刻了，”我说。当我和多尔西教授离开时，她从牙缝中吹了声口哨，“法国有一个地方，鳄鱼会跳舞。”我当时并没有立刻明白，但一分钟后我就知道这是对我学院风外表的巧妙嘲讽。
"Golly. That's pretty impressive," I said. As Professor Dorsey and I left, she whistled between her teeth, "There's a place in France where the alligators dance." I didn't get it immediately, but in a minute I knew it was a subtle slam of my preppy appearance.
尽管如此，阿特金森还是比朗克尔更亲切一些；有人在立体声音响里播放鲍勃·詹姆斯的爵士乐。朗克尔身上散发着大麻和熏香的气味，而阿特金森身上只有一部分脏衣服的味道，一部分二十种不同的洗发水的味道，还有二十份空气的味道。
Even so, Atkinson felt a little more friendly than Runkle; somebody had mellow jazz by Bob James playing on a stereo. Whereas Runkle reeked of pot and incense, Atkinson just smelled of one part dirty clothes, one part twenty different kinds of shampoo, and twenty parts air.
这套公寓很完美。里面有冰箱、水槽、卧室、客厅——所有家一般的舒适设施一应俱全。在那个位置，月租大概要 300 美元，这样就提高了我的实际时薪。
The apartment was perfect. It had a refrigerator, sink, bedroom, living room-all the comforts of home. In its location, the rent would probably have been $300 a month, thus raising my effective hourly rate.
回到办公室，阿里给了我一些建议。“你现在处境很棘手，我的朋友，”他说。“学生们可能会组织起来把你赶出去。你不仅会失去免费的食宿，而且我认为这也会影响你在这里作为学生的表现。所以我认为你应该做的是让每层楼的人都过来吃点心。每层楼可能有八到十个人，对吧？我说得对吗？这个群体足够小，你就不会那么紧张，如果你出丑，信息就会从二手资料中传播，而不是直接资料。这就是我在以色列对我的部队所做的；这是古老的‘分而治之’原则。哦，对了，还有一件事。鼓励他们尽可能自己解决争端。否则，如果他们总是想让你当裁判，你会发疯的。”
Back at the office, Ari gave me some advice. "You are in a very touchy position, my friend," he said. "The students might organize to get you thrown out. You would not only lose your free room and board; I think that might hurt your performance as a student here as well. So what I think you should do is have each floor over for dessert. There are maybe eight or ten of them on each floor; am. I correct? That is a small enough group that you will be less nervous, and if you make a fool of yourself, the information will travel secondhand, not firsthand. This is what I did with my troops in Israel; it is the old principle of 'divide and conquer.' Oh yes, and one more thing. Encourage them to settle their own disputes as much as possible. Otherwise they will drive you crazy if they want to make you the referee all the time."
“这听起来是个不错的建议，”我说。
"That sounds like good advice," I said.
“哦，还有一件事我忘了说，”阿里说。“你第一次给他们提供的食物必须非常美味，而且要摆盘精致。这就是我们在以色列对劫持人质的恐怖分子索要食物时所做的。这削弱了他们的抵抗力。” 思维扭曲 101。
"Oh, and there's one more thing I forgot to mention," Ari said. "The food you serve them for the first time has to be very good and served elegantly. That's what we do in Israel when terrorists holding hostages demand food. It weakens their resistance." Mind bending 101.
9 月 7 日
September 7
对于麻省理工学院可怜的新生来说，补习周只是他们第一次经历的非人性化体验。我记得霍普金斯的入学周。我知道我的室友是谁，我的房间在哪儿。从波托马克开车去巴尔的摩，68 年的 Mercury Park Lane 车里塞满了我的音响设备、自行车和衣服，我仍然很害怕。那里没有房间给我的父母，所以他们坐火车去，我在那里见到了他们。我想，如果我从一开始就是一个没有宿舍的人，就像麻省理工学院的他们一样，我会更害怕。
Rush week is just the first dehumanizing experience for poor little MIT first-year students. I remembered orientation week at Hop kins. I knew who my roommate would be and where my room would be. Driving up to Baltimore from Potomac, with the '68 Mercury Park Lane stuffed full of my stereo equipment and bicycle and clothes, I was still terrified. There wasn't room for my parents, so they took the train and I met them there. I think I would have been more terrified if I were a dormless person from the beginning, as they are at MIT.
霍普金斯大学俄克拉荷马分校规模小得多，因此他们可以更轻松地管理这些事情，一些校友心怀善意，愿意捐赠，这样他们就不必总是为钱而苦苦挣扎，削减预算——在霍普金斯大学，我最快乐的迎新记忆是坐在阳光普照的草地上，与我的新生迎新小组和我的顾问杰里·科洪（宾夕法尼亚大学学士；麻省理工学院博士）一起讨论环境工程和拯救世界的方法。迎新周是一段充实的一周，是一个认识新朋友、邀请他们到我的宿舍喝茶的机会。
At Hopkins-OK, it's a much smaller undergraduate school so they can manage these things more easily, and some alumni have warm enough feelings in their hearts to give it an endowment so they don't always have to be grubbing for money and cutting budgets-at Hopkins my happiest memory of orientation was sitting on the sun-drenched grass with my freshman orientation group and my adviser, Jerry Cohon (B.S., Penn; Ph.D., MIT) and talking about environmental engineering and how to save the world. Orientation week was a nurturing week, an opportunity to meet people, make friends, invite them over to my dorm room for tea.
麻省理工学院则不然。砰，你这个爱哭鼻子的小书呆子，可能一辈子都没出去约会过，欢迎你做出最后的住宿安排选择。欢迎兄弟会的兄弟们拍拍你的背，贴上一张贴纸，上面写着“这家伙是个失败者”，这是地下暗号。欢迎你被熟人抛弃，他们答应在你上厕所时等你。欢迎来到地狱。
Not so at MIT. Boom, you sniveling little nerd, who probably never went out on a date in your life, welcome to getting your last choice in living arrangements. Welcome to fraternity brothers patting you on the back and putting a sticker there that says, "This guy's a loser" in the underground code. Welcome to being abandoned by acquaintances who promise they'll wait when you go to the bathroom. Welcome to hell.
霍华德·盖尔曼是第一个到场的，他们点了香草冰淇淋和新鲜蓝莓，盛在玻璃盘子里，配上多尔西餐具套装中的镀银勺子。霍华德是来自纽约的一名身材矮小、肥胖的新生。他说话时带着一丝抱怨，想主修第六门课程。高科技。双 E。电气工程和计算机科学；简称为“EEKS”。
Howard Gelman was the first to arrive for vanilla ice cream and fresh blueberries served on glass plates with silver plated spoons from the Dorseys' flatware set. Howard was a short, fat freshman from New York. He had a whiny voice and wanted to major in Course Six. High tech. Double E. Electrical Engineering and Computer Science; pronounced "EEKS" in short form.
是时候开始赚取我的免费食宿了。
It was time to start earning my free room and board.
“那么，”我说，“你最近怎么样？”
"So," I said. "How are things going for you?"
“嗯。嗯。他们可以做得更好。我在这里，不是吗？”
"Ummmm. Ummmm. They could be better. I'm here, aren't I?"
你怎么跟这样的人说话？“那么，”我说。停顿了一下。“你在哪里上的高中？”
How do you talk to somebody like this? "So," I said. Pause. "Where'd you go to high school?"
“科学”，他指的是布朗克斯科学学院。如果他是一位才华横溢的音乐家或演员，那将是茱莉亚音乐学院，而他的答案将是表演艺术学院。但他的数学很好，比曼哈顿最好的数学还要好，而这所学校就是麻省理工学院。
"Science," he said, referring to the Bronx School of Science. If he were a talented musician or actor this would be Juilliard and his answer would have been the School for Performing Arts. But he was good in math, better than the best in Manhattan, and this was MIT.
“您住在哪个房间？”我问。
"What room are you staying in?" I asked.
“303。这只是一个临时任务。我真的很想去麦格雷戈，但他们已经满了。我要看看下学期我是否可以转到那里。”
"303. It's just a temporary assignment. I really wanted to be in MacGregor but they were full. I'm going to see whether I can transfer there next term."
祝你好运。一旦他们明白了自己的观点，房间就只有一种打开方式，我怀疑你不会想用这种方式。
Good luck. Once they see their views there's only one way a room is going to open up, and I doubt you'd want to get it that way.
我想知道什么时候会有人来。这太尴尬了。“好吧，其他人应该很快就会到的，”我说。
When is someone else going to show up, I wondered. This is too awkward. "Well, the rest of the people should be here any minute," I said.
“人们到达任何队列的概率都是泊松分布，”他说。“如果从现在到 7:10 之间有 8 个人到达，那么 15 分钟内总共会有 9 个人到达，或者说 9 分钟内每 15 分钟就会有一个人到达。到 7:05 之前再有两个人到达这里的概率是 e 的负六乘以六的三次方除以三。你有计算器吗？”
"It's a Poisson distribution, how people arrive at any queue," he said. "If eight people will arrive between now and 7:10, that will make nine total in fifteen minutes, or once per every fifteen over nine minutes. The probability that two more people will arrive here by 7:05 is e to the minus six times six cubed over three factorial. Do you have a calculator?"
这孩子真厉害。我们让他接受训练，然后离开这里，做一些有意义的事情，比如研究如何在欧洲部署军队，或者破译苏联的电报传输。
This kid's good. Let's get him trained and out of here, doing something productive like figuring out how to deploy troops in Europe or decoding Soviet cable transmissions.
“不，我更喜欢在脑子里做那些简单的事，”我说。
"No, I prefer to do the easy ones in my head," I said.
一位身穿黑色衬衫、印有红色 Sigma Delta 字样的女士走了进来。“嗨，”她说道。“我是辛迪·布鲁克斯。我就住在隔壁。”
A woman who wore a black shirt with the red letters sigma delta walked in. "Hi," she said. "I'm Cindy Brooks. I live next door."
布鲁克斯。这个名字听起来很熟悉。哦，是的，布鲁克斯教授这学期教我的高级控制课。
Brooks. That name sounds familiar. Oh yeah, Professor Brooks is teaching my advanced controls class this semester.
“你和那位教授有关系吗？”
"Are you any relation to the professor?"
“我是他的女儿。”
"I'm his daughter."
法学院的金菲尔德教授也有一个女儿。但这个故事已经写完了。
Professor Kingfield at the law school had a daughter, too. But that story's already been written.
“说说看，我喜欢你的球衣，”我指的是那件上面有红色字母的黑色足球球衣。“sigma delta 代表什么？”
"Say, I like your shirt," I said, referring to the black football jersey with red letters on it. "What does sigma delta stand for?"
“运动死亡。Sigma Delta 是高级宿舍姐妹会。实际上，我们正在寻找愿意成为一些誓言小弟弟的人。”
"Sport Death. Sigma Delta is the Senior House sorority. Actually we're looking for guys who want to be little brothers for some of the pledges."
“这涉及什么？”
"What does that involve?"
“嗯，每个人生来就有 100 分纯洁分，也就是他们没有做过的事，”她说。“我们的入会者必须填写表格，这样他们才能获得入会前的分数。要被录取，他们必须将分数降低 10%。入会后的分数是衬衫背面的数字。作为小弟弟，你会帮助他们实现这一点。名单在 35 号楼的计算机系统上。”
"Well, everyone is born with 100 purity points, or things they haven't done," she said. "Our pledges have to fill out the form, and that's how they get their preinitiation score. To get admitted, they have to reduce their score by 10 percent. The postinitiation score is the number on the back of the shirt. As a little brother you would help them accomplish that. The list is on the computer system in Building 35."
一切都可以量化。
Everything can be quantified.
“嗯，我想教堂里的朋友们不会同意的。也许你应该和霍华德谈谈。”
"Well, I don't think my friends at church would approve. Maybe you ought to talk to Howard here."
另外两个人进来，从冰箱里拿出冰淇淋。一个来自加纳；另一个是来自波兰的数学专业大二学生。前一天向客户口述这封信的黛安娜走了进来。
Two others came in and took their ice cream out of the freezer. One was from Ghana; the other was a sophomore math major from Poland. Dianne, the woman dictating the letter to her client the day before, walked in.
“这到底是怎么回事？”她问道。“你是想一层一层地讨好我们，这样我们就不会组织起来把你赶出去，然后民主地选出导师吗？你在玩‘分而治之’的游戏吗？”她面带微笑，好像她不是故意的，只是在考验我，看看她能否让我这个口头服务高手望尘莫及。
"So what's the deal here?" she asked. "Are you trying to butter us up floor by floor so we won't organize to get you kicked out and then select a tutor democratically? Are you playing some 'divide and conquer' game?" She was smiling, as if she didn't mean it, but was just testing me, seeing whether she could put a verbal service ace past me.
“说说看，你觉得今年谁会赢得世界大赛冠军？”我问道。这招在大多数圈子里都管用；在大多数圈子里，甚至没人注意到这是一种规避动作。
"Say, who do you think is going to win the World Series this year?" I asked. That works in most circles; in most circles no one even notices it's an evasive maneuver.
“不不不不不。你不会轻易放过我的。”她反驳道。
"No no no no no. You're not getting off that easy," she volleyed back.
“那么，如果你处在我的位置上，你会怎么做呢？”
"Well, what would you do in my situation?"
“不要用问题来回答问题。是我先问的，”她说。
"No answering a question with a question. I asked first," she said.
其他六名学生一边吃着冰淇淋，一边听着那位波兰数学学生说一切都是数学，所有工程都只是被美化的技术工作，一边听着门口的交谈。
The other six students ate their ice cream, half-listening to the Polish mathematics student say that everything is mathematics and all engineering is just glorified technician work, half-listening to the verbal exchange near the door.
“好的，是的，”我说道。
"OK, Yes," I said.
“是，什么？”
"Yes what?"
“是的，就像这场骗局中所有获胜者一样，我也是个贪财的下流货色，靠着金钱的诱惑才获得现在的地位。你想怎么做呢？”
"Yes, like everyone else on the winning side of this con game, I'm a money-grubbing sleazeball who greased my way into this position. What do you want to do about it?"
“哦，没什么。我只是好奇。我说，你那儿有一辆意大利赛车吗？也许我们可以骑一会儿。”
"Oh, nothing. I was just curious. Say, is that an Italian racing bike you've got there? Maybe we can go riding sometime."
9 月 15 日
September 15
电话响了；是我妈妈打来的。
The phone rang; it was my mother.
“佩珀，你父亲又住院了。他们不知道是心脏病发作还是癌症，还是其他什么原因。他发烧了，正在服用各种药物。他们不知道他这次能不能挺过来，也许你应该过来——”
"Pepper, your father's in the hospital again. They don't know whether it's a heart attack or cancer or what. He's got a fever and he's on all kinds of medication. They don't know whether he's going to make it this time, and maybe you should come down to-"
“我将搭乘下一班飞机。”
"I'll be on the next plane."
我和父亲单独待在病房里，看着他。他睡着了，病号服下面的裸露胸部贴着电极；他的烧还没退。床边有一台带蓝屏的示波器，监测着他的生命体征。它就像我在麻省理工学院牢房里的示波器一样。
Alone with him in the hospital room, I looked at my father. He was asleep, with electrodes taped to his bare chest underneath the hospital gown; the fever hadn't left him. Next to the bed there was an oscilloscope with a blue screen, monitoring his vital signs. It was like the oscilloscope in my cell at MIT.
我想知道护士和医生是否像我一样看待快速压缩机，把他看作一个有输入和输出的设备，在图表上产生点，需要分析、讨论、推理和争论的点。也许他们确实这样想，这样他们就可以与那些没有成功的人保持距离。
I wondered whether the nurses and doctors looked at him the same way I looked at the rapid compression machine, as a device with inputs and outputs, generating points on a graph, points to be analyzed, discussed, reasoned through, argued about. Maybe they did think that way so they could distance themselves from the ones that didn't make it.
请不要让他现在死去。求求你。让我们再照顾他几年，也许足够我们见到他的孙子了。
Please don't let him die now. Please. Let us have him for a few more years, maybe long enough to see his grandchildren.
护士进来给他量体温。
The nurse came in to take his temperature.
“这很奇怪，”她说。“在过去的半个小时里，他的体温下降了一点。也许他的情况正在好转。”
"That's odd," she said. "It went down a degree in the last half hour. Maybe he's turning the corner and getting better."
这可能只是巧合。
It was probably just a coincidence.
或者是？
Or was it?
章节
C H A P T E R
12
12
270
Two Seventy
卡洛里克家族的成员还留在学院，足以再次组建一支 C 联赛足球队，尽管许多人已经升职，在好学校担任教授，或在行业内找到高薪工作。不过卡洛斯还在这里，戴夫·奥洛斯基也在这里。
Enough of the Calorics were still at the institute to field a C-league soccer team again, although many had moved outward and upward to professorships at good schools or high-paying jobs in industry. Carlos was still here, though, and Dave Orlowski, too.
与 TEP 的比赛下半场后期比分是 0-0。我像往常一样在左边锋，卡洛斯在右边，戴夫在中锋。
The score in the game with TEP was 0-0 late in the second half. I was at left wing as usual, Carlos at right, Dave at center.
左后卫罗宾将球传给我，我轻轻一触球就将球传给了卡洛斯。他向守门员射门，但被戴夫挡开，我们以教科书般的方式获胜。
Robin, the left halfback, passed up to me; I one-touched it to Carlos. He shot toward the goalie but Dave deflected it and we won in textbook style.
10 月 19 日
October 19
“我们将次优化定义为优雅地解决错误的问题，”威尔逊教授在设计课上讲道。重新摆放沉没的泰坦尼克号上的甲板椅就是一个例子。”说到沉船，我很好奇威尔逊在我们近一年前推出的脚踏驱动的乘员舱方面取得了怎样的进展。
We define suboptimization," Professor Wilson lectured the design class, as elegantly solving the wrong problem. Rearranging the deck chairs on the sinking Titanic is an example." Speaking of sinking ships, I wondered how Wilson had progressed with the pedal-powered crew shell we'd launched almost a year before.
课程 270，设计导论，是我本科必修课程之一。它是我和硕士学位之间最可怕、最大的障碍，因为 270 有竞赛。工程师和设计师每天都在竞争，以最低的成本制造出最好的产品。还有什么比直接参加竞赛，制造出执行规定任务的最佳设备更好的方法来完善你的工程教育呢？
Course Two Seventy, Introduction to Design, was on my list of required undergraduate courses. It was the scariest, biggest hurdle between me and my master's degree because two seventy had The Contest. Engineers and designers compete every working day of their lives to make the best product at the lowest cost. What better way to round out your engineering education than to compete directly, in a contest to build the best device to perform a stated task?
威尔逊继续说道：“现在我想换个话题，谈谈比赛。今年的比赛与往年略有不同。今年，你们不必像弗劳尔斯教授那样，给你们一袋材料，而是必须从‘商店’购买，我们会给你们 12,500 美元的‘预算’。此外，你们还必须安装一些微电子器件。助教之一奈杰尔·亚当斯认为，任何一位机械工程师在离开麻省理工学院之前，都至少要安装一块集成电路。今年比赛的目的是把最重的重物举上山，如果你的电子器件能正常工作，你将获得 500 克的额外重量。此外，今年我们将在 11 月的第三周进行初步淘汰赛，在此期间，你将能够多次测试你的设备。比赛本身将在感恩节前的星期一晚上举行。”
Wilson continued, "Now I'd like to change the subject a bit and talk about The Contest. This year The Contest will be a little different from those of years past. Instead of giving you all the same bag of materials, as Professor Flowers has done, this year you'll have to buy things from a 'store,' and we'll give you a 'budget' of $12,500. Also, you'll have to put in some microelectronics. One of the teaching assistants, Nigel Adams, thinks that no mechanical engineer should leave MIT without having wired up at least one integrated circuit. The point of this year's contest is to lift the most weight up a hill, and you'll receive a 500-gram bonus weight if your electronics works. Furthermore, this year we'll have preliminary elimination rounds during the third week in November, in which you'll be able to test your device several times. The Contest itself will be on Monday night before Thanksgiving."
我觉得我真的应该读读这些宣传资料。我只知道，在二十秒内，一些重物必须升到坡道顶部，而且只能用一个小型电动机和两个小型弹簧，再加上“商店”里的其他东西。所有部件必须放在一个大约面包盒大小的几何空间内，并且资金空间不超过 12,500 美元。
I really should read some of those handouts, I thought. All I knew was that some weight had to go to the top of a ramp in twenty seconds, and with just a little tiny electric motor and two little tiny springs, together with whatever else was available in the "store." All the components had to fit within a geometric space about as big as a breadbox, and within a financial space of 12,500 funny dollars.
10 月 26 日
October 26
“我最好赶快把这个蠢东西搬走”，这句话一直萦绕在我的脑海里，让我烦躁不已，于是我最终去了那个叫“Tiny”的 400 磅重的技师的店里，看了看赛道。赛道分为两个部分；比赛将以一对一的方式进行，两个部分互为镜像。中线两边都有刻度，看起来有好几种方法可以成功上去。地形的一侧有一条胶合板制成的蜿蜒道路。道路的边界是一条人造草皮覆盖的障碍赛道，包括一个“仙人掌”（一根棍子上的金属绿色 U 形），旨在防止我们都从中间上去。
"I better get moving on this stupid thing" was going through my head with nagging regularity, so I finally went down to the shop of the 400-pound technician named "Tiny" and looked at the course. It had two halves; The Contest would be run one-on-one, and the halves were mirror images of each other. Scales were on either side of the center line, and it looked as if there were several ways to go up successfully. There was a plywood winding road on one side of the terrain. Bounded by the road was an astroturfcovered obstacle course, including a "cactus" (a metal green U on a stick), designed to prevent us from all going up the middle.
我看了看课程，不知道该做什么，于是我查看了“商店”的样品：一台 2 瓦的发动机，售价 1,000 美元；木条，每条 250 美元；螺丝，50 美元；铜焊条，每米 75 美元；压舌板，25 美元；橡皮筋，100 美元；以及一个四门微电脑芯片，售价 500 美元。处理完所有物品后，我又看了看课程。盘点过程中，我有几个想法。我在课程中遇到了两个大三学生。
I looked at the course and couldn't decide what to do, so I checked out the sample "store" items: a 2-watt motor for $1,000; wood strips, $250 each; screw, $50; copper welding rod, $75 per meter; tongue depressor, $25; rubber band, $100; and a four-gate microcomputer chip for $500. When I'd finished handling all the items, I looked at the course again. A couple of ideas had come to me during the inventory. I met two juniors at the course.
其中一人表示：“我认为这条路绝对是正确的选择。”
"I think the road is definitely the way to go," one of them said.
我同意了。“你只需要造一辆可以上路的小卡车；造一个可以载着装满碎石的可乐瓶，然后自己上路的东西也很容易，”我说，“或者你可以从这里的‘仙人掌’下面钻过去，或者造一辆绕着仙人掌走的宽大的越野车，或者造一个像埃菲尔铁塔里的电梯一样把重物举起来的配重系统怎么样？”
I agreed. "All you have to do is build a little truck that goes up the road; it would be pretty easy to make something that carries a Coke bottle full of gravel and steers itself up the road," I said, "or you could go underneath the 'cactus' here, or build a wide off-road vehicle that goes around the cactus, or how about a counterweight system that lifts the weight up like the elevator in the Eiffel Tower?"
我们又聊了一会儿，他们也有很多想法。我回到办公室。炖菜已经开始沸腾了。
We talked a while longer, and they, too, had many ideas. I went back to my office. The stew had begun to simmer.
“你为什么不造一个像起重机一样能伸出手臂的东西呢？”阿里建议道。他不仅开过坦克，还设计过坦克，我很重视他的意见。伸出手臂会让问题变得更加复杂。我怎么能把 41/2 英尺长的东西塞进 2 英尺长的面包盒里呢？
"Why don't you build something that extends an arm out there like a crane?" Ari suggested. Not only had he driven tanks, he'd also designed them, and I valued his opinion. Extending an arm out would add another dimension to the problem. How could I fit something 41/2 feet long into a 2-foot-long bread box?
10 月 28 日
October 28
晚上 9:47 “一辆消防车！”当我走出斯隆实验室前往高级宿舍时，我突然想到了这一点。我会做一个像消防车上的伸缩梯，这样它就可以把重量推到秤上。
9:47 P.M. "A fire truck!" It came to me as I walked out of the Sloan Lab on my way to Senior House. I'd build an extension ladder just like the ones on fire trucks, and it would push the weight onto the scale.
10 月 29 日
October 29
中午我去了消防部门，看看这些东西在现实生活中是如何工作的。拉斐特广场有一辆吊钩云梯车；这辆车是 1941 年制造的，云梯是 1960 年安装的。它是一个巨大的铝制结构，我盯着所有的电缆和滑轮看了将近一个小时，却怎么也搞不清楚它是如何工作的。肖纳西中尉提出在星期六早上帮我把云梯搬出去，并演示它的伸展，但星期六是学习日，所以我只是画了一些机制就离开了。
At noon I went to the fire department to see how these things work in real life. There was a hook and ladder truck at Lafayette Square; the truck had been built in 1941, and the ladder was mounted in 1960. It was a huge aluminum structure, and I looked at all the cables and pulleys for almost an hour and couldn't for the life of me figure out how it worked. Lieutenant Shaughnessy offered to take the ladder out for me on Saturday morning and demonstrate its extension, but Saturday was to be a study day, so I just sketched a few mechanisms and left.
11 月 5 日
November 5
160 名学生的班级被分成 10 个“复习小组”。这些小组每周聚会一小时，进行比大型讲座形式更具互动性的教学。汤姆·布莱教授比我去年秋天对林德伯格的了解更多，我曾向他提议用风车和热泵为堪萨斯农舍供暖，他是我的复习老师。他为班上 160 名学生中的大约 20 名进行了个人咨询。汤姆将决定我的成绩。
The class of 160 students was divided into 10 "recitation sections." These met for an hour once a week for more interactive instruction than was available in the larger lecture format. Tom Bligh, the professor who'd known more about Lindbergh than I did the previous fall, and with whom I'd proposed to heat Kansas farmhouses with windmills and heat pumps, was my recitation instructor. He gave personal consultations to about 20 of the 160 students in the class. Tom would determine my grade.
每周与你的背诵老师开会的一个好处是，这会迫使你做一些事情。会议有点像我们为斯隆实验室的研究赞助商准备的进度报告。所以我前一天晚上熬夜过半夜，试图弄清楚如何建造我的消防车梯子。
One advantage of having a meeting with your recitation instructor every week is that it forces you to do something. The meeting was sort of like the progress reports we prepared for the research sponsors in the Sloan Lab. So I was up past midnight the night before, trying to figure out how to build my fire engine ladder.
“我会把木头切成三条宽度相同的木条，然后把其中两条粘成 L 形横梁。这样应该会相当坚固，而且做起来很容易，成本也很低，”我说。我和同学们已经开始称这些材料便宜或昂贵，好像这些指定的“成本”有实际意义似的。
"I'll cut the wood into three strips of equal width, and then glue two of the three into an L-shaped beam. That should be fairly strong, it's easy to make and cheap," I said. My classmates and I had started calling materials cheap or expensive, as if the assigned "costs" had real meaning.
一些小的设计细节已经开始浮现。我应该在梯子上放多少个横撑/横档？梯子应该有多宽？我将如何延长它？是时候随心所欲了。从五个横撑开始，看看是否足够。如果不够，再放更多。我开始给自己写越来越多的笔记。“只要建造这个东西，让它工作并测试，”我一直告诉自己。所以我花了星期五晚上的时间用环氧树脂和木头，以及一块 1 英寸厚的不锈钢将木头固定在一起，直到环氧树脂变硬。
Already little design details started popping up. How many cross braces/rungs should I put in my ladder? How wide should it be? How will I extend it? It was time to be arbitrary. Start with five cross braces and see whether that's enough. If not, put more in. I began to write more and more notes to myself. "Just build the thing, get it working and tested," I kept telling myself. So I spent Friday night with epoxy and wood, and a piece of stainless steel 1 inch thick to hold the wood together while the epoxy hardened.
11 月 6 日
November 6
我的 L 型梁效果非常好。环氧树脂变硬了；我从来没想过木头会那么硬。我预计八点钟会有一大群人，于是我来到 Tiny 的店里，但大多数人都睡懒觉了，我找到了一台可用的钻床，在上面钻孔安装铜棒。我在两英尺内放了五个横档，再次为坚硬、轻盈的效果感到惊讶。
My L-beams came out really well. The epoxy hardened; I would never have believed wood could be that stiff. Expecting a mob at eight, I arrived at Tiny's shop, but most people slept in and I found an available drill press on which to drill the holes for my copper rods. I put five rungs in two feet, and again I was amazed at the stiff, light results.
钻了二十个孔花了我一上午的时间，等我钻完时，现场已经人头攒动。每个人的背包里都装满了木条和焊条；对于大多数人来说，这是施工的第一天。有些人建造了框架，有些人为他们的 2 瓦电机建造了驱动系统，其他人则在车床上用纤维板加工车轮。
It took all morning to drill the twenty holes, and by the time I finished the place was hopping. Everyone had backpacks filled with wood strips and welding rod; for most of them it was the first day of construction. Some built frames, some built drive systems for their 2-watt motors, others machined wheels from masonite on the lathes.
到了下午 1 点，我的梁和焊条开始看起来像梯子，有人说：“这是我见过的最好的轨道。”
By 1:00 my beams and welding rod began to look like a ladder and somebody said, "That's the best track I've seen yet."
我说：“谢谢，但这不是跑道，而是梯子。”
I said, "Thanks, but it's not a track, it's a ladder."
他说：“哦。不管它是什么，它建造得很漂亮。”
He said, "Oh. Well, it's nicely built, whatever it is."
下午 2:00，我将绳子交织在梯子的横档之间，这样当我拉动绳子的一端时，绳子就会完全伸展开来。这招奏效了！但当我在上面放一个重物时，绳子几乎一点儿也不伸展。
2:00 P.M., and I had my string interlaced among the rungs of my ladder so that it extended fully when I pulled on one end. It worked! But when I put a weight on it it hardly extended at all.
“解决重量支撑问题”，我在实验室笔记本中写道——这可真是个难题。如果我把梯子对准秤，梯子末端和下方地形之间的角度会保持不变，但梯子末端的高度会随着爬坡而变化。我确信我不想设计一个在爬坡时会收缩的轮子组件。是时候骑自行车了。
"Resolve weight support problem," I wrote in my lab notebook-and what a problem it was. If I aimed the ladder at the scale, there would be a constant angle between the end of the ladder and the terrain below, but the height of the ladder end would vary as it would climb the hill. I was sure I didn't want to design a wheel assembly that would contract as it climbed the hill. Time for a bike ride.
11 月 7 日
November 7
晚上 9:20 在做机械制图作业时，我目不转睛地看着梯子。我一直在想，我该如何支撑这个重量？梯子看起来很棒，但它永远无法正常工作。一定有办法支撑重量。
9:20 P.M. In the middle of my mechanical drawing assignment, I couldn't keep my eyes off the ladder. I kept thinking, How am I going to support that weight? The ladder looks great, but it will never work as is. There's got to be a way to support the weight.
然后，灵感来了。我头顶上突然灵光一闪，从办公桌抽屉里拿出一些橡皮筋。为什么不先用橡皮筋把梯子射出来，再用绞盘把重物吊上“轨道”呢？
And then it came. The light bulb appeared over my head and I took some rubber bands out of my desk drawer. Why not shoot the ladder out with rubber bands, then winch a weight up the "track"?
凌晨 12:40，我仍在床上辗转反侧，想着各种方法把梯子拉出来，把重物拉上来：我开始着迷了。这个词有了新的含义。字母滴滴答答，就像贝蒂·戴维斯电影的开头一样，我意识到 270 已经征服了我。
12:40 A.M., and I was still tossing and turning in bed with the ideas of different ways to shoot the ladder out and haul up the weight: obsession was beginning. The word obtained new meaning. The letters dripped as at the beginning of a Bette Davis movie and I realized that two seventy had me.
11 月 8 日
November 8
“这真是一个优秀的工程，”汤姆·布莱一边检查我的梯子一边说道。“你知道，我不明白为什么选修这门课程的人会把工作做得如此马虎，而且还自甘堕落。对于一名工程师来说，除了高质量之外，没有别的方法可以做到。”
"Now this is a good piece of engineering," Tom Bligh said as he examined my ladder. "You know I don't see how some of the people who take this course can do the slipshod work they do and live with themselves. For an engineer, there should be no other way to do things than with high quality."
“好吧，我的优势在于我已经做了近两年的实验室技术员，并且知道如何正确设置和构建它们，”我说。我试图保持谦虚，但我意识到我所要做的就是继续努力，这样我就能拿到我的第二个 A。
"Well, I've got the advantage of having effectively worked as a lab technician for almost two years, and I've seen how to set things up and build them right," I said. I tried to be modest, but I realized that all I had to do was to keep up the good work and I'd have my second A.
“是的，你还有很多事情要做，而且时间不多了，”他说，我同意了。“让我们试着用恒力弹簧来射击吧。”
"Yes, well you've still got a lot to do and not a lot of time to do it," he said and I agreed. "Let's try shooting this out with the constant force spring."
他把梯子卷起来，把一个梯级放在另一个梯级上，弹簧完全拉长。“你站在我对面，”他说。“注意你的眼睛。”他松开手时，我离他大约五英尺远。上层梯级飞到了我的怀里。“我认为它有足够的弹力爬上山；你觉得怎么样？”他问道。
He wound up the ladder and put one stage on top of the other with the spring fully stretched. "You stand over there across from me," he said. "Watch your eyes." I was about five feet from him when he let go. The upper stage flew right into my arms. "I think it's got enough pop to go up the hill; what do you think?" he asked.
“我想我在做生意，但是还有很多事情要处理，”我说。
"I think I'm in business but have a lot of business to attend to," I said.
“只要尽快让它运转起来就行，”他说。
"Just get it working as quickly as you can," he said.
11 月 9 日
November 9
任务：支腿、止回机构、将重物拉上轨道的推车、滑轮、电机驱动系统、框架。细节、细节、细节，足以让你发疯。暂时忘掉电子产品吧：它只值 500 克。但我还得处理其他问题，而且我必须在快速压缩机的论文工作上保持一些进展。啊。这就是为什么麻省理工学院是美国最好的工程学院，也就是说，世界上最好的工程学院。
Tasks: legs, nonreturn mechanism, cart to pull weight up track, pulley, drive system for motor, frame. Details, details, details, enough to drive you crazy. Forget electronics for now: it's only worth 500 grams. But I have to work on other problem sets, too, and I have to maintain some semblance of progress with my thesis work on the rapid compression machine. Aargh. So this is why MIT is the best engineering school in the United States, which means in the world.
晚上 9:00 “阿里，这件事让我越来越着迷。我什么都做不了，什么都想不了。有太多事情要做，我必须继续做下去，而我的时间已经不多了。”
9:00 P.M. "Ari, it's becoming an obsession to me. I can't do anything else or think of anything else. There's so much to do, and I have to keep things rolling, and I'm running out of time."
“是的，它就像 co ca heen，”他回答道。
"Yes, it's like co ca heen," he answered.
“像什么？”
"Like what?"
“Co ca heen，你知道，你把它吸进去，”他用鼻子深吸了一口气，“你吸得越多，你想要的就越多。”
"Co ca heen, you know, you breathe it in," and he took a big breath through his nose, "and the more you breathe in the more you want."
“确实如此，”我边说边回去看看我的机器。
"That's it exactly," I said as I went back to look at my machine.
11 月 10 日
November 10
是时候审查预算了：恒力弹簧，500 美元；木条，1,750 美元；纤维板，1,000 美元；电机，1,000 美元；焊条，350 美元……总计 4,600 美元。还剩下将近 8,000 美元。是时候为第二天做计划了。有组织的拖延很有用，因为决定在机械车间要做什么通常比实际做这件事花费的时间更长。
Time to review the budget: constant force spring, $500; wood strips, $1,750; masonite sheet, $1,000; motor, $1,000; welding rod, $350 ... $4,600 total. Almost $8,000 left. Time to plan for the next day. Organized procrastination is useful because deciding what you're going to do in a machine shop usually takes longer than doing it.
我必须设计那个框架。这很容易，但我无法克服阻碍我解决那个子问题的惯性。不过，如果我能在明天晚上之前完成框架，我就会处于良好的状态。
I've got to design that frame. It's easy, but I can't overcome the inertia keeping me from that subproblem. If I can build the frame by tomorrow night, though, I'll be in good shape.
11 月 11 日
November 11
退伍军人节那天，我去参加了关于核战争的宣讲会吗？没有……正如约翰·贝鲁西所说。我致力于我的 270 项目。
Veteran's Day and did I go to the teach-in on nuclear war? Nooooo00 ... as John Belushi would have said. I worked on my two seventy project.
下午 4:00 我在大圆顶前等着吃沙拉三明治。一位 37 岁的大胡子男子走下台阶，朝波士顿走去。他穿着蓝色牛仔裤，膝盖以下是皮革和木头。他是一名越战老兵，他为和平而奋斗。
4:00 P.M. I waited for my falafel in front of the Great Dome. A bearded man, thirty-seven, walked down the steps toward Boston. He wore blue jeans and leather and wood from his knee down. A Vietnam veteran, he made time for peace.
晚上 9:00 “你知道会造成多大的破坏吗？”阿里激烈地说道。“这至少会让你倒退 100 年。从本质上讲，你是靠前几代人的劳动成果生活的。一定不能发生核战争。”
9:00 P.M. "Do you realize what destruction there would be?" Ari said vehemently. "It would set you back at least 100 years. Essentially you are living on the work of all the generations before you. There must not be a nuclear war."
我有点惊讶，因为我认为阿里，我认识的最坚定的反苏鹰派，会向我保证这些武器是必要的，可以将熊关在笼子里。“而且，”他说，“那里没有人，没有学生，没有人。你们这些人一点都不关心这件事吗？这可能是世界末日，那里没有人。”
I was a little surprised because I thought Ari, the staunchest anti-Soviet hawk I knew, would assure me that the weapons were necessary to keep the bear in its cage. "And what's more," he said, "there was nobody there, no students, nobody. Don't you people care at all about this? It could be the end of the world and there'd be no one there."
“但我还有 270 项目要操心，”我说，“我明年还会去。”
"But I have my two seventy project to worry about," I said. "I'll be there next year."
“明年将会是别的样子。”
"Next year it will be something else."
11 月 12 日
November 12
参赛者带着看起来像机器的设备来到机械车间。背着装有木条的背包的人越来越少，而背着装有未完成设备的箱子的人越来越多。我还处于背包阶段。
Contestants arrived at the machine shop with machinelike-looking devices. Fewer and fewer carried backpacks with wood strips in them, and more and more carried boxes with partially completed devices. I was still at the backpack stage.
下午 3:00 布莱教授外出了，所以我和格里菲斯教授聊了聊。他把自行车停在海伍德、威尔逊和威尔逊的旁边。和他们一样，他也为能源行业提供咨询。和他们一样，他骑自行车上班是因为他重视效率。他说：“关键是，你可以花两个小时做这个项目，做一个弹射器，然后把重物放在秤上，或者你可以花两年时间，把太空计划的努力投入其中。我们试图教你根据有限的时间和资源做出决定。现实世界一直都是这样的。”
3:00 P.M. Professor Bligh was out, so I spoke with Professor Griffith. He parked his bicycle next to Heywood's, Weare's, and Wilson's. Like them, he consulted to the energy industry. Like them, he bicycled to work because he valued efficiency. He said, "The point is, you could spend two hours on this project, make a catapult, and put a weight up on the scale, or you could spend two years on it, and put the effort of the space program into it. We're trying to teach you to make decisions based on limited time and resources. That's what the real world is like all the time."
下午 7:00 疯狂时刻。我不知道这门课让我精神崩溃了多少次。我的个人日程安排和目标都落后了。我必须建立这个框架，但它涉及太多细节，我不知道从哪里开始。
7:00 P.M. Freak-out time. I wondered how many nervous breakdowns this course had produced. I was slipping on my personal schedule and goals. I had to build that frame, but it involved so many details I didn't know where to start.
我和阿里谈了谈。“冷静点，”他说。“到目前为止，你做得很好。继续努力，不要让压力压垮你。”
I talked to Ari. "Calm down," he said. "You've done good work so far. Just keep it up and don't let the pressure overwhelm you."
“你说得对。但今晚我太紧张了，没法思考。我得去滑冰。”于是我就去了溜冰场。那里大约有一百名滑冰者，冰面被切得粉碎——就在 Zamboni 清理干净十五分钟后。Zamboni 看起来对我来说更容易理解。我想把它拆开，看看它的每个小部件是如何工作的。
"You're right. But tonight I'm so wound up I can't think. I've got to go skating." So I went to the rink. There were about a hundred skaters there and the ice was really chopped up-only fifteen minutes after the Zamboni had cleaned it off. The Zamboni looked more comprehensible to me. I wanted to take it apart and see how every little piece of it worked.
那里有很多滑冰者，他们突然开始又突然停止。对于麻省理工学院的学生来说，滑冰就像磨牙一样，而冰球是最受欢迎的校内运动。在艰难地滑了五十圈之后，我回到了高级宿舍，享受本周最美的一夜。
There were many skaters there, starting and stopping abruptly. Skating is like grinding one's molars together for MIT students, and ice hockey is the most popular intramural sport. After fifty hard laps, I went to Senior House for my good night's sleep of the week.
11 月 13 日
November 13
下雨了。谢天谢地，否则我可能会浪费一整天的时间骑自行车，以避免完成我的项目。我上到 3 号楼的楼上，那里已经搭建好了练习跑道。房间里还有另一个人。他有一台带有大纤维板轮子和木制轮毂的机器，他正试图用抓钩抓住篮板，用绞盘把他的卡车拉到秤上。
Raining. Thank goodness for that, or I'd have probably blown the whole day cycling to avoid working on my project. I went upstairs in Building 3 to where the practice track had been set up. There was one other guy in the room. He had a machine with big masonite wheels and wooden hubs and was trying to make his grappling hook catch the backboard and winch his truck up to the scale.
我必须搭建框架。这意味着：计算要切割的木块的高度并切割它们。然后列出任务清单。1. 切割两块 3-5/s 英寸的木块。2. 切割两块 5-'/2 英寸的木块。3. 切割两块 73/16 英寸长的木块。4. 将环氧树脂片拼接在一起。5. 切割焊条。6. 切割凹槽以留出间隙。在这种事情中保持理智的唯一方法是列出清单然后检查所有事项。
I had to build the frame. That meant: figure out heights of wooden pieces to cut and cut them. Then make a list of tasks. 1. Cut two 3-5/s-inch pieces. 2. Cut two 5-'/2-inch pieces. 3. Cut two pieces 73/16 inches long. 4. Epoxy pieces together. 5. Cut welding rods. 6. Cut notches for clearance. The only way to keep your sanity in this kind of thing is to make lists and then check things off.
学生机械车间全天开放，3 号楼地下室无人失业。每台车床、每台带锯、每台铣床、每台钻机都在不断使用。战时。创新研究、开发、制造只需几分钟、几小时。只剩下 120 小时。没有时间拖延。270 是工程学的有机化学实验室。有机实验室给医学预科生手术室带来压力；270 给工程师生产线带来压力。人们开始互相问：“这有效吗？”每次听到这个问题，我让它发挥作用的决心就增强了。
The student machine shop was open all day and there was no unemployment in the basement of Building 3. Every lathe, every bandsaw, every milling machine, every drill was in constant use. Wartime. Innovations researched, developed, manufactured in minutes, hours. Only 120 hours left. No time to procrastinate. Two seventy is the organic chemistry lab of engineering. Organic lab gives premeds operating room pressure; two-seventy gives engineers production line pressure. People began to ask one another, "Does it work?" Each time I heard the question my commitment to make it work was heightened.
晚上 9:30，我坐在男厕所（3-126），感觉整栋楼都因地下室机器的嗡嗡声而震动。每次从地下室的车间上下楼梯到四楼的试验场，去年最好的机器的展示都吸引了我的眼球。它们放在 Mikic 办公室对面的柜子里；我那一年最好的机器将在 1 月份在那里。我不再那么累了。
9:30 P.M. I sat in the men's room (3-126) and felt the whole building vibrate from the whirr of the machines in the basement. On each trip up and down the stairs from the workshop in the basement to the testing ground on the fourth floor, the display of the best machines from the year before caught my eye. They were in the case across from Mikic's office; the best machines from my year would be there in January. I became less tired.
晚上 11:00 所有机器都关闭了。我没听到声音。有人启动了带锯。
11:00 P.M. A moment when all machines were off. I missed the noise. Someone turned on the bandsaw.
11 月 14 日
November 14
待办事项：午饭后在图书馆阅读周日漫画。在延伸部分钻孔，以防它散开。将底座粘在一起。要做的事情太多了。要处理的细节太多了。
To do: Read Sunday comics in library after lunch. Drill holes in extension to catch it as it flies apart. Glue base together. So much to do. So many piddly details to attend to.
晚上 8:50 我需要家人的支持，所以我打电话回家。
8:50 P.M. I needed familial support so I called home.
“佩珀，我有个坏消息要告诉你，”我妈妈说。“你的狗刚刚死了。”
"I have some sad news for you, Pepper," my mother said. "Your dog just died."
为什么这一切必须一下子发生？为什么我不等到比赛结束后再打电话，这样我就不用担心这件事了？挂断电话后，我踢了一个塑料饼干托盘，它碎了。
Why does it have to happen all at once? Why didn't I wait until after the contest to call so I wouldn't have to worry about this? After I hung up, I kicked a plastic cookie tray and it shattered.
阿里跑到我的办公室，发现我正在抽泣。“你必须重新振作起来。这里的教授不在乎你发生了什么；他们只关心你取得了什么成果。现在去洗漱一下，回去工作。你必须完成你已经开始的工作。”他这样说，就好像我是他那些被炮弹击中而受到惊吓的士兵之一。他很坚定，我很感激。
Ari ran over to my office and found me sobbing. "You have to get back in control. The professors here don't care what happened to you; they just care about what you produce. Now go and wash yourself and go back to work. You must finish the job you've started." He said it as if I were one of his soldiers who was shellshocked. He was firm, and I appreciated it.
12:30 AM 框架完工。我比计划晚了一天，但至少我可以睡觉了。
12:30 A.M. The frame was complete. I was one day behind schedule, but at least I could sleep.
11 月 15 日
November 15
上午去上课；下午从事电子工作。
A.M. go to class; P.M., work on electronics.
“我该如何使用这个绕线工具？”我问辛迪。
"How do I use this wire-wrap tool?" I asked Cindy.
“很简单，”她一边说，一边用工具将两根电线固定在我芯片的针脚上。“好了，你现在就试试。”
"It's easy," she said as she used the tool to fix two wires around pins on my chip. "There. You try now."
这很简单。对我来说，技术方面的又一个谜团烟消云散了。辛迪完成了电路布线，另一个女大学生向我寻求帮助。
It was easy. Another mystery of technology had vaporized for me. Cindy finished wiring her circuit, and another undergraduate woman asked me for help.
“这很容易，”我说，并向她演示了如何连接电线。她很漂亮，我提醒自己，当我还是新生时，她才六年级——千万别想约她出去。
"It's easy," I said, and I showed her how to attach the wire. She was beautiful, and I reminded myself that when I was a freshman she was in sixth grade-don't even think of asking her out on a date.
下午 6:30 经过三次重新接线，我的电路终于正常工作了。如果不出意外，我就能赢得 500 克的奖励重量。
6:30 P.M. After rewiring it three times, my circuit finally worked. If nothing else, I would win the 500-gram bonus weight.
11 月 16 日
November 16
我的机械制图测试直观而简短，但不幸的是，我没有收到第二页，不得不稍后在布莱的办公室完成测试。就在我开始认为自己很聪明的时候。我已经完成了框架、电子设备和梯子。剩下的就是建造驱动系统。即使那是最难的部分，那又怎么样？我的钱快用完了。我买不起商店出售的现成杆的“成本”，所以我必须在车床上加工更便宜的方杆。这只需要三个小时。我不仅是发明家、研究员、生产线工人和成本会计；我还是一个微观经济学家，用时间（即劳动力（即我的睡眠））换取资本（即现成商品）。
My mechanical drawing test was intuitive and short, but unfortunately I didn't receive page two and would have to finish the test later in Bligh's office. Just when I was beginning to think I was smart. I'd completed the frame, the electronics, the ladder. All that remained was to build the drive system. So what if that would be the hardest part? I was running out of money. I couldn't afford the "cost" of the ready-made rods that the store sold, so I'd have to turn down a cheaper square bar on the lathe. That would take only three hours. Not only was I inventor, researcher, production line worker, and cost accountant; I was a micromicroeconomist trading time-i.e., labor (i.e., my sleep)-for capital, i.e., readymade goods.
四个小时后，我完成了轴的加工。
Four hours later I finished machining the shaft.
11 月 17 日
November 17
早上 7:00 距离第一次试验还有 36 个小时。我早早地去了斯隆实验室，这样我就可以请尼克帮我安装实验室的车床来加工驱动轮的纤维板。
7:00 A.M. Thirty-six hours left until the first trials. I went to the Sloan Lab early so I could recruit Nick to help me set up the lab's lathe to machine the masonite for my drive wheel.
上午 9:55 去拿计算器和书籍，准备完成机械制图考试的剩余部分。我对自己说：“就假装你在西点军校，每天都要考试。”
9:55 A.M. Go to pick up calculator and books for rest of mechanical drawing test. I said to myself, "Just pretend you're at West Point and you always have a test every day."
上午 10:45 回来向 Nick 寻求更多帮助。
10:45 A.M. Back to get more help from Nick.
下午 12:10 尼克去吃午饭。
12:10 P.M. Nick went to lunch.
下午 1:20 还剩 30 小时。我不能因为驱动系统故障而毁掉一切。这台机器看起来太好了，不能错过期末考试。我必须完成它。待办事项：1. 将电线焊接到电机引线上。2. 调低电机轴。3. 构建驱动系统。4. 为驱动系统制作轴承。5. 构建驱动系统。我写了两遍以示强调。
1:20 P.M. Thirty hours left. I can't blow everything because of a nonfunctioning drive system. The machine looks too good to miss the finals. I've got to finish it. To do: 1. Solder wires to motor leads. 2. Turn down motor shaft. 3. Build drive system. 4. Make bearings for drive system. 5. Build drive system. I wrote it twice for emphasis.
我知道我需要每一个小时。我太紧张了，没法焊接电线，所以我稍微作弊了一下，玛丽冷静而迅速地帮我焊接好了。
I knew I'd need every hour. I was so nervous I couldn't solder the wires, so I cheated a little bit and Mary calmly, quickly soldered them for me.
晚上 8:00，我开玩笑地问助教 Nigel Adams：“你打算让这家 270 的机械车间通宵营业吗？”我一半希望他说不，这样我就可以睡一觉了，一半希望他说可以，这样我就可以坚持到最后。
8:00 P.M. I jokingly asked Nigel Adams, the teaching assistant, "Are you going to keep the two-seventy machine shop open all night?" I half-wanted him to say no so I could get some sleep, half-wanted him to say yes so I could fight to the wire.
“是的。'
"Yes.'
晚上 11:00 机械车间里有 15 个人，更不用说 Tiny 车间里有 10 个人，楼上跑道上还有 10 个人在测试；有人拿来了一个音箱，让我们熬过通宵。人们大声唱歌。你可以听到他们的声音，甚至超过了机器的嗡嗡声。
11:00 P.M. Fifteen people in the machine shop, not to mention ten in Tiny's shop and ten upstairs testing at the track; somebody brought in a boom box to keep us going through the gang-allnighter. People sang along at the top of their lungs. You could just hear them over the whirr of the machines.
凌晨 2:00 两根轴都已安装完毕。是时候调低驱动轮，使其适合轴承了。
2:00 A.M. Both shafts done. Time to turn down the drive wheel to make it fit in the bearing.
凌晨 3:30 将驱动轮压入轴上。快速确定钻头尺寸。
3:30 A.M. Press fit drive wheel onto shaft. Make quick decision on drill sizes.
凌晨 4:00 轮子在轴上转动。如果你能坚持到凌晨 4:00，夜晚的后背就被打破了。我遇到了 Eddy，他是去年阻止我伤害自己的看门人。“没时间说话了，Eddy，我待会儿再跟你聊。”我说。
4:00 A.M. The wheel was on the shaft. If you make it to 4:00 A.M., the back of the night is broken. I met Eddy, the janitor who'd kept me from hurting myself the year before. "No time to talk, Eddy, I'll catch up with you later," I said.
早上 6:30 我的轮轴在黑色聚四氟乙烯上钻孔制成的轴承中轻松移动。还有希望。是时候清理一下了，这样就没人知道我们三十五个人整晚都在那里。研究所的保险公司会怎么说？
6:30 A.M. My wheel's axle moved easily in the bearing I'd made by drilling a hole in a piece of black Teflon. There was hope. Time to clean up so nobody would know the thirty-five of us were there all night. What would the institute's insurance company say?
早上 8:00 吃甜甜圈和酸奶作为早餐。
8:00 A.M. Doughnut and yogurt for breakfast.
上午 8:15 午睡时间。
8:15 A.M. Nap time.
11 月 18 日
November 18
我的数字闹钟显示 12:50，而考试时间是中午。哎呀！马上穿好衣服，跑过校园。在实验室里，我看不懂时钟。它看起来像是 11:30，但又有点像 12:30，而我睡了三个小时，却分不清时间。“冷静下来，”我对自己说。“报时。”
My digital alarm clock said 12:50 and my test was at noon. Aieeee! Get into clothes in a second and run across campus. At my lab I couldn't read the clock. It looked like 11:30, but sort of like 12:30 and I couldn't tell the difference on three hours' sleep. "Calm down," I said to myself. "Call the time."
“铃声一响，时间就是 11 点 32 分 20 秒。”
"At the tone the time will be 11:32 and 20 seconds."
下午 1:30 Chet 有时会表现得很粗鲁，但他内心深处是个好人。我请 Chet 帮忙修理驱动系统。
1:30 P.M. Chet could be rough around the edges at times, but deep down inside he was a good guy. I asked Chet for help with the drive system.
这是他表现出乐于助人的一次机会。“就这样把它拼起来，然后用 5 分钟环氧树脂胶粘上去，”他说，我们两个人在 2:00 之前就完成了搭建。
This was one of the times his helpfulness showed through. "Just put it together like this and glue it with 5-minute epoxy," he said, and the two of us finished construction before 2:00.
下午 3:00 我在 Lobdell 遇见了 Cindy Brooks。她端着一个托盘，上面放着五个三明治，坐在我的桌子旁边。
3:00 P.M. I met Cindy Brooks at Lobdell. She had a tray with five sandwiches and she sat at my table.
“我希望你能坐在这里，”我说。
"I was hoping you'd sit here," I said.
“呃。哦，天哪，我随便坐。”她很尴尬。我想，下次别这么强势了。
"Uh. Oh, gee, I just sit wherever." She was embarrassed. Next time don't come on so strong, I thought.
“为什么这么多三明治？”我问。
"Why so many sandwiches?" I asked.
“这是我接下来三十个小时的食物，”她回答道。“我的预赛是明天。”
"This is my food for the next thirty hours," she answered. "My preliminary round is tomorrow."
“好吧，祝你好运。待会儿见。”我说。
"Well, good luck. See you later," I said.
下午 4:00 驱动系统投入运行！
4:00 P.M. Drive system operational!
下午 5:00 在轨道上测试。梯子没有按应有的方式展开。下楼并安装止动装置。我一直把绳子穿错，各部分相互卡住。但它有潜力。绳子缠绕在绞盘轴上，就像在真正的绞盘上一样。
5:00 P.M. Testing on the track. The ladders didn't deploy the way they should. Go downstairs and put stops in. I kept threading the string wrong, and the sections jammed against each other. But it had potential. The string wound around the winch shaft just like on a real winch.
下午 7:00 试验，第一轮。另一位朗诵老师布兰科教授说：“我们只是想看看周一是否有可能成功。”更多的希望。
7:00 P.M. Trials, round one. Professor Blanco, another recitation instructor, said, "We just want to see something that has a good chance of working on Monday." More hope.
我的第一轮。梯子伸出去后，由于自身重量而倒下。我下楼做支撑物来接住它。
My first round. The ladder went out but as it extended it fell under its own weight. I went downstairs to make supports to catch it.
晚上 8:00 做支撑。我该怎么做？我没有时间。我厌倦了做这些愚蠢的决定。钻头在哪里？我要做多长的焊条？哎！啊！我不得不离开车间，撞到墙上，靠在墙上，努力不哭出来。这个愚蠢的方法几乎成功了。如果我没有进入决赛，我花的所有时间都浪费了。然后……冷静下来。你所要做的就是钻几个孔，放一些焊条进去。今晚就这样了。
8:00 P.M. Make supports. How do I do it? I don't have time. I'm sick of making all these stupid decisions. Where are the drill bits? How long do I make the rods? Aieee! Aargh! I had to leave the shop, hit the wall, and stand against it and try not to burst into tears. The stupid thing almost works. If I don't make it to the finals all the time I've spent is wasted. Then ... Calm down. All you have to do is drill a couple of holes and put some welding rod in. That'll do for tonight.
我做到了，它也做到了。梯子没有爬到天平上，但它足够让我留在希望的竞技场上。
I did and it did. The ladder didn't make it to the scale but it went far enough to keep me in the arena of hope.
晚上11点，我走下楼梯，遇见了一位看上去年轻的大二学生。
11:00 P.M. I walked down the stairs and encountered a youngish looking sophomore.
“嗅探嗅探。”
"Sniff, sniff."
“最近怎么样？”我戴上“导师”的帽子问道。
"How's it going?" I asked, putting on my "tutor" hat.
“这不管用”，抽泣声变成了抽泣声。
"It doesn't work," and the sniffs became sobs.
“你的审判什么时候开始？”
"When's your trial?"
“明天吧。我已经连续三个晚上没睡了，但是还是没用。”
"Tomorrow. I've been up all night for the past three nights and it still doesn't work."
我怎么知道你的感受，我想。“我知道你正在经历什么。如果不可能让整个事情顺利进行，为什么不为接下来的几个小时设定一些个人目标呢？比如，尝试让一两个子系统工作起来。”
How I know how you feel, I thought. "I know what you're going through. If it's not possible to make the whole thing work, why don't you set some personal goals for the next few hours; say, try to get one or two subsystems to work."
“我已经从这门愚蠢的课程中得到了我想要的一切。”
"I've already gotten all I want to out of this stupid course."
懦夫。
Wimp.
辛迪在商店楼下外面，与航空工程部门的一名人员一起工作。
Cindy was downstairs, outside the store, working next to a guy from the Aeronautical Engineering department.
“我真不敢相信这个部门的人竟然如此友好，”她说。
"I can't believe how friendly people are in this department," she said.
“也许是因为我们比你们航空业的人有更广泛的职业选择，”我说。
"Maybe it's because we have wider career options than you aero guys," I said.
“是的，比如制造烤面包机而不是杀手卫星，”辛迪补充道。“或者玩具。为美泰玩具公司工作不是很有趣吗？”
"Yeah, like making toasters instead of killer satellites," Cindy added. "Or toys. Wouldn't it be fun to work for Mattel Toys?"
这是我一生中第一次想到，只要我愿意，我就能为美泰玩具公司工作。
For the first time in my life I thought I could work for Mattel Toys if I wanted to.
11 月 19 日，星期五
Friday, November 19
休息日，用于处理被忽视的细节，例如支付账单。
Rest day, and time to catch up on neglected details, e.g., paying bills.
晚上 11:00 滑完冰。运动中心的牌匾很有道理：“不是猎物而是追逐；不是荣誉而是比赛”（伯吉斯，1885 年）。
11:00 P.M. Finished skating. The plaque in the athletic center rang true: "Not the quarry but the chase; not the laurel but the race" (Burgess, 1885).
午夜时分。我把梯子的横档喷成银色。就算没有别的，看起来也不错。
'Round midnight. I spray-painted the ladder rungs silver. It would look good if nothing else.
11 月 20 日
November 20
今天本来应该轮到我骑自行车了，因为我的装置应该能用，但布莱建议我把设计改成梯子，后面有铰链，前面有手推车轮子。这样也许可以解决因自身重量而摔倒的问题。
This was supposed to be my day for cycling because my device was supposed to work, but Bligh suggested I change the design to a ladder with a hinge at the back and a wheelbarrow wheel on the front. That might solve the falling-under-its-own-weight problem.
因此这意味着：1. 打破上周末我建造的美丽底座上的环氧树脂粘合。2. 为梯子前部建造一个轮子组件。这项工作很繁重，但这是我唯一的机会。布兰科教授曾经说过，他花了七年时间开发一款产品，却被一家德国公司窃取了。“你必须能够改变，”他说。“你投入了这么多工作，你一边抱怨一边想，‘但改变需要这么长时间……我已经做了这么多……我不想改变它。’但你必须灵活，愿意忘记你花在一条路上的所有时间，然后转身走另一条路。否则，你将无法生存。”
So that means: 1. Break epoxy bonds on the beautiful base I built last weekend. 2. Build a wheel assembly for the ladder's front. It was a lot of work but my only chance. Professor Blanco once said that he spent seven years developing a product only to have it stolen by a German company. "You have to be able to change," he said. "You put in so much work and you think as you whine, 'But it will take so long to change ... I did so much already ... I don't want to change it.' But you have to be flexible, willing to forget about all the time you spent going one way, and then turn around and go another way. Otherwise, you will not survive."
下午 4:00 辛迪的机器是一台抓钩发射器，其结构质量无与伦比，甚至连我的都不如。“你能成功吗？”我问她。
4:00 P.M. Cindy's machine was a grappling hook launcher with a quality of construction second to none, even mine. "Are you going to make it?" I asked her.
“我希望如此，但我今晚和明晚几乎都会在这里待一整晚，”她说。
"I hope so, but I'll be here almost all night tonight and tomorrow night," she said.
“这是一台漂亮的机器。你应该全力以赴让它运转起来。你还有四十八小时，然后你就可以睡觉了，”我说。
"It's a beautiful machine. You should really sprint to make it work. You've got forty-eight hours and then you can sleep," I said.
晚上 9:00 我必须想办法为这个愚蠢的梯子前面做个愚蠢的轮子，所以我不得不上楼。上个星期天拉起 8 磅重物的那个家伙拿着他的抓钩在那里。他正在和一个 Course Six 的极客聊天。
9:00 P.M. I had to figure out how to make the stupid wheel for the front of the stupid ladder, so I had to go upstairs. The guy who'd pulled up eight pounds the Sunday before was there with his grappling hook. He was talking to a Course Six geek.
“我认为设计是我的强项之一，”他说。
"I think design is one of my strong points," he said.
闭嘴，你这个书呆子。
Shut up, you nerd.
“你的那个星期四没起作用，是吗？看上去不错，但根本没用，”他一边看着我试验梯子支架的高度，一边说道。
"Yours didn't work Thursday, did it? It looks good but it didn't work," he said as he watched me experiment with the heights of my ladder supports.
“这有用，”我说，他的责备让我的语气更加强硬。这种事情是判断你是否是 A 型人格的好方法。
"It'll work," I said, and his chiding made it more imperative. This kind of thing is a good way to tell whether you're a Type A.
他继续和朋友聊天。“我爸爸上的是哈佛大学。我考上了，但我不想去那里。我觉得如果我去麻省理工学院，我会成为一名工程师。他很失望。”
He continued his conversation with his friend. "My dad went to Harvard. I got in there but I didn't want to go there. I figured I'd be more of an engineer if I went to MIT. He was disappointed."
“我爸爸是麻省理工学院的毕业生，”另一个人说。“他现在在德雷珀公司工作。你绝对猜不到我妈妈去了哪里。”
"My dad's MIT cubed," the other one said. "He works at Draper now. And you'll never guess where my mom went."
“西蒙斯？”八磅重的家伙说道。
"Simmons?" the eight-pound guy said.
“你说对了。”
"You got it."
“你现在在和一个西蒙斯家的女人约会吗？”抓钩先生问道。
"Are you dating a Simmons woman now?" Mr. Grappling Hook asked.
“没有，但我去那里参加了很多聚会。”
"No, but I go to a lot of parties there."
“不是要转移话题，但这门课让你和那些整夜陪伴你的人变得像家人一样。这很有趣，”我离开房间时 GH 说。
"Not to change the subject, but this class makes you become like family with all the people you stay up all night with. It's kind of fun," G.H. said as I left the room.
周日凌晨 1:00。我得把这个轮子粘起来，但我不知道怎么做。光是决定如何切割一块木头就花了很长时间。此外，所有的钻头都没有标记，所有的尺子和千分尺都被刷掉了，所以我必须目测一切。此外，我想睡觉了。
1:00 A.M. Sunday morning. I've got to glue this wheel but I don't know how to make it. It's taking forever just to decide just how to just cut just one piece of wood. Besides, all the drills are unmarked and all the rulers and micrometers have been swiped so I'll have to eyeball everything. Besides, I want to go to sleep.
努力奋斗，坚持下去。只要让事情运转起来就行。不要担心做得有多好。只要让它运转起来就行。只要把木片切下来，然后把它们粘在一起。在砂带机上做砂轮。即使它看起来像《摩登原始人》里的东西，那也好过什么都没有。
Fight it. Stay with it. Just make the thing work. Don't worry about how well. Just make it work. Just cut the pieces of wood and glue them together. Make the wheel on the belt sander. So what if it looks like something from "The Flintstones"; it's still better than nothing.
凌晨 4:00 环氧树脂开始凝固，车轮看起来不错。设计已经成为我的一部分，而我也成为了设计的一部分。
4:00 A.M. The epoxy was setting and the wheel looked good. The design had become me, and I had become the design.
11 月 21 日
November 21
下午 2:00 距离 26-100 的比赛还有 29 小时。辛迪说：“你听说昨天哈佛发生的事情了吗？在足球比赛中，就在一次触地得分之后，一根小管子从球场上冒了出来。然后一个气球开始膨胀。它是黑色的，上面写满了 MIT 的字样。最后它爆炸了，冒出了黄色的烟雾。这件事登上了全国每家报纸的头版。这一定是本世纪最大的黑客事件。270 年代的一些人参与了这件事。”
2:00 P.m. Twenty-nine hours left before the contest in 26-100. Cindy said, "Did you hear about what happened at Harvard yesterday? At the football game, right after one of the touchdowns, a small pipe sprang out of the field. Then a balloon started inflating. It was black, and it had MIT written all over it. Finally it blew up and yellow smoke came out of it. It was on the front page of every newspaper in the country. It's got to be the hack of the century. Some of the people in two-seventy were in on it."
麻省理工学院得一分。
Score one for MIT.
下午 7:00 辛迪看着她的抓钩发射器。“我太沮丧了，”她说。“它不会用了。这玩意儿老是裂开，轴承也掉出来了。”
7:00 P.M. Cindy looked at her grappling hook launcher. "I'm so depressed," she said. "It's not going to work. This thing keeps splitting and the bearings fall out."
“你为什么不试着将木头旋转 90 度，这样轴承就不会试图将它折断了呢？”我建议道。
"Why don't you try turning the wood 90 degrees so the bearing won't be trying to break it apart?" I suggested.
“这是个好主意。但我还需要一根橡皮筋来固定我的驱动系统，现在没有像我之前那样的橡皮筋了，而且我必须去普里切特小吃店工作，我已经筋疲力尽了。”
"That's a good idea. But I also need a rubber band for my drive system and there aren't any left like the one I had and I have to go work at the Pritchett snack bar and I'm exhausted."
“听着，你现在不能放弃。如果你放弃的话，你永远不会原谅自己。”我说。
"Look, you can't give up now. You'll never forgive yourself if you do," I said.
“我会考虑一下。”
"I'll think about it."
晚上 10:30 我和 Ari 聊了聊麻省理工学院的薪酬政策。我打开办公桌抽屉，发现了十根各种形状和大小的橡皮筋。我去 Pritchett 把它们交给 Cindy，但她已经下班了。她在宿舍里。
10:30 P.M. I chatted with Ari about pay policy at MIT. I opened my desk drawer and found ten rubber bands of all sizes and shapes. I went to Pritchett to give them to Cindy but she was already off work. She was in her dorm room.
我说：“我找到了这些，觉得它们可能会有帮助。”她仔细查看了这些，找到了一个完美的。
"I found these and thought they might help," I said. She looked through them and found one that was perfect.
“哇哦。这些太棒了。非常感谢。”
"Oh wow. These are great. Thanks a lot."
凌晨 1:10 距离发射还有 18 个小时。不要放弃！我把它写在实验室手册上，以鼓励自己继续下去。两个学生在工作时戴着随身听。我很好奇他们怎么能集中注意力。
1:10 A.M. Eighteen hours to launch. Don't quit! I wrote it in my lab book to keep me going. Two students wore Walkmen while they worked. I wondered how they could concentrate.
凌晨 3:00 开始测试。另外十个人也在测试他们的机器。我的机器差点就弹起来了；打火石轮运转良好，但绳子摩擦力太大，马达停转了。
3:00 A.M. Started testing. Ten other people were testing their machines. Mine almost sprang up; the Flintstone wheel worked nicely, but there was too much friction in the rope and the motor stalled.
凌晨 4:30，辛迪来到测试跑道。
4:30 A.M. Cindy was at the test track.
凌晨 5:00 尝试不同的弹簧和绳子组合；我两次把绞盘绳子的穿线拧坏了。八磅重的 GH 先生走了进来。
5:00 A.M. Try different combinations of springs and string; I screwed up the threading of the string for the winch twice. Mr. eight-pound G.H. walked in.
“我以为这里不会有人，”他说。
"I thought there'd be nobody here," he said.
“承认吧，你就是来幸灾乐祸的。”我冷笑道。
"Admit it; you just came here to gloat," I sneered.
上午 6:30 比赛继续进行，但机器仍然无法工作。在最后一次比赛中，我装错了弹簧。那次比赛失败后，我不得不撞上什么东西，而最接近的就是一盒电脑卡。我试着将它们按顺序放回盒子里，并告诉自己比赛结束后在盒子上留张纸条。7:00，我把八个人留在了测试室，然后给机器喷了一层红色喷漆。
6:30 A.M. Trials proceeded but the machine still didn't work. On the last trial I misloaded the springs. I had to hit something after that trial failed, and a box of computer cards was the closest thing. I tried to put them back in the box in order, and told myself to leave a note on the box some time after the contest. I left eight people in the testing room at 7:00 and gave the machine a coat of red spray paint.
11 月 22 日
November 22
十九年前，约翰·菲茨杰拉德·肯尼迪遇刺身亡。
Nineteen years ago John Fitzgerald Kennedy was assassinated.
上午 10:30 电话响了。是汤姆·布莱打来的。“你的机器能用吗？”他问。“我今晚要制定名单，如果到 2:00 还不能用，你就不能进入决赛了。”
10:30 A.M. The phone rang. It was Tom Bligh. "Is your machine working?" he asked. "I have to make the list for tonight, and if it doesn't work by 2:00 you won't be in the finals."
“如果你不打电话，它肯定不会奏效，因为我会睡一整天。我想我可以在 2:00 之前让它恢复正常。”我回到跑道，那里有四十个人，在最后一刻进行调整、测试，然后又进行最后的调整。“哦，该死的”，“哦，该死的”，每分钟发出大约二十次的频率。
"If you hadn't called, it surely wouldn't have worked because I would have slept all day. I think I can make it work by 2:00." I went back to the track and forty people were there, making lastminute adjustments, testing, and making more last-minute adjustments. "Oh s-," "Oh f-," emanated at a frequency of about twenty times per minute.
我重新进行了前一天晚上中止的试验。它几乎达到了规模，布兰科教授对此印象深刻。汤姆·布莱走了进来，我头上又亮起了一个灯泡。“我做安慰剂怎么样？”我问。“再给我一个弹簧，我的机器就能完美运转了。”
I reran the aborted trial of the night before. It almost, almost reached the scale and Professor Blanco was impressed. Tom Bligh walked in, and another light bulb lit over my head. "How about I be one of the placebos?" I asked. "Let me have one more spring and my machine will work perfectly."
由于比赛是一对一淘汰制，就像网球锦标赛一样，有些回合的参赛者人数是奇数，或者有些选手缺席。270 的传统是，为了避免让任何选手幸运地“轮空”进入下一轮，会安排一名“安慰剂”，即一名与没有对手的选手对抗的选手。就像糖丸一样，安慰剂不是正式的参赛者，但它可能是有效的。
Since the contest was a one-on-one elimination like in a tennis tournament, some rounds would have an odd number of contestants, or some no-shows. Instead of letting anyone luck into the next round by a "bye," two-seventy tradition was to have a "placebo," an entry that would oppose the opponentless player. Like a sugar pill, the placebo was not an official contestant, but it could be effective.
“这个主意不错，”汤姆说。“我们去试试吧。”
"That's a good idea," Tom said. "Let's go for it."
下午 4:00 “我和一位姓氏为爱尔兰语的中尉谈过借消防员头盔和雨衣参加麻省理工学院的比赛。你能想到那人是谁吗？”我问消防队长。
4:00 P.M. "I talked with a lieutenant with an Irish last name about borrowing a fireman's helmet and raincoat for a contest at MIT. Can you think of who that would be?" I asked the fire chief.
“我们都是爱尔兰人，”他回答道。“不过，你到消防站来吧，我们会看看能为你做些什么。”
"We're all Irishmen," he answered. "But come on up to the firehouse and we'll see what we can do for you."
下午 6:45 26-100 号房间已经满员，但我找到了最后一个靠过道的座位。我像母亲抱着孩子一样抱着我的机器。有很多纸飞机被扔了。
6:45 P.M. Room 26-100 was already full to capacity, but I found one of the last aisle seats. I held my machine like a mother holds her baby. There were a lot of paper airplanes being thrown.
下午 7:00 威尔逊教授让观众安静下来。“在我们开始之前，我想先平息一个流传已久的谣言。今晚，我再说一遍，我们的舞台上不会有一个巨大的深红色气球在膨胀。”六百名观众发出了令人毛骨悚然的吼声。“我们将进行一对一比赛，直到决出胜者。第一轮将有四十场比赛，第二轮将有二十场，等等。”
7:00 P.M. Professor Wilson quieted the crowd. "Before we start, I would like to squash an ugly rumor that has been circulating. There will not, I repeat, there will not be a large crimson balloon inflating on our stage tonight." A chill-breaking roar went about the crowd of six hundred. "We'll go one-on-one for as many rounds as it takes to get a winner. The first round will have forty contests, the second will have twenty, etc."
第一场比赛是在一名迷你足球运动员和一辆迷你卡车之间进行的，前者将重物踢到秤上，后者从仙人掌下面穿过。
The first contest was between a miniature football player that kicked the weight onto the scale and a miniature truck that went under the cactus.
“踢，踢，踢，踢”，观众们大喊，嘭！小小足球运动员将一粒胶卷罐足球踢进仙人掌枝丫间的射门，击败了对手。
"Punt, punt, punt, punt," the audience shouted, and boom! the little football player kicked a film canister football for a field goal through the arms of the cactus and beat his opponent.
八场比赛之后，抓钩选手的对手没有出现。“我们需要安慰剂，”威尔逊教授说。我带着我的红色和银色“消防车”以及消防员头盔和雨衣走上舞台。
Eight contests later the opponent of the grappling hook guy didn't show. "We need the placebo," Professor Wilson said. I walked to the stage with my red and silver "fire truck" and my fireman's helmet and raincoat.
人群高呼“Pla-cee-boh、pla-cee-boh、pla-cee-boh”。
"Pla-cee-boh, pla-cee-boh, pla-cee-boh," the crowd chanted.
我走到起跑坡道。我放下设备。我接上电源线。威尔逊教授打开了电源。
I walked to the starting ramp. I put my device down. I hooked up the power wire. Professor Wilson flipped on the power.
“松开！”我的弹簧式打火石轮消防车梯在十分之一秒内使秤产生 1 盎司的偏转。抓钩向一侧射出，没有击中篮板，GH 先生的卡车沉入水中，一动不动。
"Thawockkk!" My spring- loaded-Flintstone-wheel- fireengine-ladder put a 1-ounce deflection on the scale in a tenth of a second. The grappling hook shot off to the side, missed the backboard, and Mr. G.H.'s truck was dead in the water.
我看着威尔逊教授。威尔逊教授看着我。
I looked at Professor Wilson. Professor Wilson looked at me.
“太棒了，佩珀。”
"That was great, Pepper."
章节
C H A P T E R
十三
13
自杀无痛苦吗？
Is Suicide Painless?
11 月 21 日
November 21
比赛结束后，我帮助格里菲斯、布莱和威尔逊举起了 26-100 的比赛物品，并于 11:00 回到我的导师公寓。天哪，我很高兴比赛结束了，我想。现在我可以休息一会儿，也许直到圣诞节。啊，现在我可以睡觉了。是的，接下来的四周我都可以好好睡一觉了。
I helped Griffith and Bligh and Wilson lift the pieces of the contest out of 26-100 after it was over and went back to my tutor apartment at 11:00. Boy, am I glad that's over, I thought. Now I can coast for a bit, maybe until Christmas. Ah, now I can sleep. Yes, a nice restful sleep for the next four weeks.
当我走过三楼楼梯平台上的大富翁游戏时，他们说道：“佩珀，这梯子太棒了。简直棒极了。”
I walked past the Monopoly game on the third floor landing and they said, "Great ladder, Pepper. Wicked awesome."
哎呀，没什么。
Aw shucks, it was nothing.
Campagnolo 自行车零部件工程总监当时就在观众席中。他是威尔逊的好友，”黛安娜说。“也许你可以找他帮忙。”
The engineering director of Campagnolo cycling components was in the audience. He's a buddy of Wilson," Dianne said. "Maybe you can hit him up for a job."
“是的，那太好了。也许我会尝试一下。”
"Yeah, that'd be great. Maybe I'll try that."
克维尔，克维尔，克维尔。
Kvel, kvel, kvel.
我向辛迪的出色表现表示祝贺；她的抓钩进入了半决赛。
I congratulated Cindy on her performance; her grappling hook made it to the semifinals.
“哦，顺便说一下，”她说，“约翰·多西在你门下留了一张纸条。他说这很重要。”
"Oh, by the way," she said, "John Dorsey left a note under your door. He said it was important."
总有事发生，不是吗？如果不是一件事，那就是另一件事。就像吉尔达·拉德纳的祖母罗珊娜·丹娜经常说的那样。
It's always something, isn't it. If it's not one thing it's another thing. Just like Gilda Radner's grandmother Nanna Rosanne Rosanna Danna always used to say.
“请来见我。如果你在 11:30 之前到我的公寓，就来我这里吧。”
"Please see me. Come by my apartment if you're in by 11:30."
哦，不。也许他们想让我离开，然后我就得重新开始买杂货和付房租了。我走到克拉夫茨的多尔西家的公寓。
Oh, no. Maybe they want me out and I'll have to start buying groceries and paying rent again. I walked over to the Dorseys' apartment in Crafts.
“嗨，约翰。有什么事吗？”
"Hi, John. What's up?"
“是史蒂夫·沃森，”约翰说。“他有严重的情绪问题。他情绪低落，孤独，已经开始担心期末考试了。精神病医生办公室和一位宗教顾问都和他谈过了，他们认为他快要康复了。他几乎用三年半的时间完成了本科学习，而他还不到十九岁。我想他正在逐渐意识到自己没有生活。”
"It's Steve Watson," John said. "He's having serious emotional troubles. He's depressed and lonely and already worried about finals. The psychiatrist's office and one of the religious counselors have both talked to him, and they think he's close to rounding the bend. He's almost finished his undergraduate work in three and a half years and he's not even nineteen yet. I think he's in the process of realizing he doesn't have a life."
他年仅十九岁，出生于古巴导弹危机和肯尼迪遇刺事件之间。
At nineteen, he was born some time between the Cuban missile crisis and Kennedy's assassination.
“哎呀，太糟糕了，”我说。“史蒂夫·沃森是谁？”
"Gee, that's terrible," I said. "Who's Steve Watson?"
“他是你宿舍里的学生之一。难道你还没有认识他们每个人吗？你知道，这是你导师工作的一部分。无论如何，我们希望你能留意他，也许可以招募一些宿舍里的学生做同样的事情，让他们对他友好，你也要对他友好，试着让他感觉到他过去三年半的生活并不是完全没有感情的。”
"He's one of the students on your entry. Haven't you gotten to know every one of them? That's part of your tutor job, you know. Anyway, we'd like you to keep an eye on him, maybe recruit some of the students in the entry on his hall to do the same, have them be friendly to him, you be friendly to him, try to make him feel that his last three and a half years were not a total emotional vacuum."
“我会尽我所能，约翰。嘿，我已经尽力去认识每个人了。好吧，也许不是叫名字，但至少能认出面孔。我的意思是，每次学习休息前，我都会贴出告示，然后去敲每扇门。如果这孩子总是待在他的实验室里，我能帮上忙吗？”
"I'll do what I can, John. And hey, I've done my best to get to know everyone. Well, maybe not by name, but by face anyway. I mean before every study break, I put the signs up and then go and knock on every door. Can I help it if this kid is always at his lab?"
“不，你不能，我相信你已经尽力了。主要的事情是照顾史蒂夫。我在这里当了三年舍监，还没有发生过自杀事件，如果我能帮忙的话，只要我在，就不会再发生自杀事件了。”
"No, you can't, and I'm sure you're doing your best. The main thing to do is to take care of Steve. I've been housemaster here for three years and there hasn't been a suicide yet, and if I can help it there won't be any for as long as I'm here."
“我也是，约翰。你对我该如何和他谈话有什么建议吗？”
"Ditto for me, John. Do you have any suggestions for how I should talk to him?"
“尽量表现得自然些，不要表现出你在监视他。试着对他感兴趣的事情产生兴趣。我听说他喜欢下棋。也许你可以和他下棋，或者鼓励其他学生也这样做。”
"Just try to be natural; don't let on that you're keeping an eye on him. Try taking an interest in things that are interesting to him. I heard he likes to play chess. Maybe you can have a game with him or encourage the other students to do the same."
我想，我这个拿薪水的职员，居然还要拿薪水才能对这个孩子好，这真是太糟糕了。其他人没有时间或意愿。每个学校都有孤独的人，但麻省理工学院对他们来说就像一块磁铁。当你把八个孤独的人放在一个宿舍楼层时，你会得到什么？八个非常孤独的人。
It's really too bad that I, a paid staffer, have to be paid to be nice to this kid, I thought. Nobody else has the time or the inclination. There are loners at every school but MIT is a magnet for them. And what do you get when you put eight loners on a dormitory floor? Eight very lonely people.
12 月 11 日
December 11
在度过了一个轻松的感恩节之后，在假期过后的一个半星期里，我多次试图找到他，终于见到了史蒂夫。他家门上贴着一块写着“我应该自杀吗？”的便笺板，便笺板下面是“是”和“否”两栏。“否”下面有七个标记，而“是”下面有两个标记。有人在其中一个“是”标记旁边写了“跳，跳”。在下方，另一个人手写了“生活很痛苦，然后你就死了”。史蒂夫一定很高兴知道有人关心他。
After a restful Thanksgiving, and after several attempts at finding him during the week and a half following the vacation, I met Steve. There was a noteboard on his door that said, "Should I kill myself?" and beneath it there was a Yes column and a No column. There were seven hash marks under No and two under Yes. Somebody'd written, "Jump, jump" to the side of one of the Yes marks. On the bottom someone else's hand had written, "Life's a bitch, and then you die." It must have made Steve happy to know that people cared.
史蒂夫皮肤苍白，脸上有一块正在消退的粉刺，下巴上留着一小撮棕色胡须，还有一撮小胡子。他身材苗条、高大、沉默寡言。当然，他很沉默寡言；这就是他不认识任何人的原因。
Steve had pale skin, a receding case of acne, a little brown beard on his chin, and a mustache. He was slim, tall, and quiet. Of course he was quiet; that's why he didn't know anyone.
“嗨，”他开门时，我说道，“我是佩珀·怀特，是导师。我还没有机会和大家见面，但我尽量确保能见到大家，并让大家知道，考试周期间，每天晚上都会有学习休息时间。如果你想过来聊聊，请随时敲我的门。”
"Hi," I said when he opened the door. "I'm Pepper White, the tutor. I haven't had a chance to meet everyone yet, but I'm trying to make sure I meet everyone and let you all know that there will be a study break every night during exam week. And if you ever want to come by and chat, feel free to knock on my door."
“他们让你这么做的，是不是？”他说。
"They put you up to this, didn't they?" he said.
“干什么？喂，那儿有棋盘吗？我也喜欢下棋。也许我们可以什么时候下棋。”
"Up to what? Say, is that a chess set there? I like to play chess, too. Maybe we can have a match sometime."
抑郁症一定削弱了他的抵抗力，削弱了他从环境中吸收的愤世嫉俗情绪。“当然，那太好了，”他说。他笑了笑，似乎对任何友谊的提议都心存感激。
The depression must have weakened his resistance, the cynicism that he'd absorbed from the environment. "Sure, that would be nice," he said. He cracked a smile, apparently thankful for any offer of friendship.
“明天下午 1 点半怎么样？”我问。
"How about tomorrow at 1:30 in the afternoon?" I asked.
“好的。”
"OK."
黛安娜开始玩保龄球，用一个真正的保龄球和两升的空姜汁汽水瓶作为球瓶。砰！球击中了史蒂夫旁边厚重的橡木门。十个球瓶中有三个倒下了。
Dianne started bowling with a real bowling ball and empty two-liter ginger ale bottles as the pins. Thunk! The ball hit the heavy oak door next to Steve's. Three of the ten pins went down.
“嘿，你能把它放在那里吗？”我说。
"Hey, can you keep it down there?" I said.
黛安娜反驳道：“如果我不练习，我怎么能在这方面有所进步呢？”
Dianne retorted, "How am I going to get any better at this if I don't practice?"
“黛安娜，你认识史蒂夫吗？他是数学和物理专业的。你上过一些物理课，对吧？”
"Say, Dianne, do you know Steve? He's a math and physics major. You've taken some physics classes, haven't you?"
“哦，好的，好的，”黛安娜说，她很快就明白了我的意思。“史蒂夫，你不是和我一起上相对论课吗？弗伦奇教授讲课很厉害，不是吗？我对黑洞史瓦西半径的材料有点困惑。你能帮我把它概念化吗？”
"Oh, yeah, sure, OK," Dianne said, quickly figuring out what I was hinting. "Aren't you in my relativity class, Steve? That Professor French, he can really lecture, can't he? I'm having a little trouble with the material on the Schwarzschild radius for black holes. Could you help me conceptualize it?"
“这是一个相当简单的概念，”史蒂夫说，他因为有机会向别人解释某件事而信心倍增。“数学有点复杂——我的意思是，这是一个微分方程的奇点解——但这个想法是，当你接近黑洞，并在时空连续体中与它相距一定距离时，就没有回头路了。”
"It's a pretty easy concept," Steve said, his confidence growing at the chance to explain something to someone. "The mathematics is a little hairy-I mean, it's a singular point solution for a differential equation-but the idea is that as you approach a black hole, and you come within a certain distance of it in the space-time continuum, there's no turning back."
“你的意思是你会像科幻电影里那样被吸入其中？”黛安娜问道。
"You mean you sort of get sucked into it, like in a sci-fi movie?" Dianne asked.
“是的，就是这样，”史蒂夫说。“你明白双胞胎的问题吗？其中一个离开地球，以接近光速的速度旅行，六十年后回来，而他的兄弟已经老了六十岁，而他却没有？”
"Yeah, that's it," Steve said. "Did you understand the problem about the twins, one of whom leaves earth and travels at close to the speed of light and he comes back sixty years later, and his brother has aged sixty years but he hasn't?"
“当然，”黛安娜说，“这是狭义相对论，我认为我已经掌握了它。”
"Sure," Dianne said, "that's special relativity, and I think I've got a handle on that."
黛安娜开始解释这个问题，我想她暂时已经解决了史蒂夫的问题，所以我找了个借口说：“明天 1 点半我们可以一起下棋，好吗，史蒂夫？”
Dianne started to explain the problem, and I figured she had Steve covered for the time being so I excused myself and said, "I'll see you at 1:30 tomorrow for that chess game, OK, Steve?"
12 月 12 日
December 12
星期天。下午 1:30 时，史蒂夫还在睡觉。心情低落时，你只想睡觉，而在麻省理工学院，你几乎没有时间睡觉，因此你只想睡觉，你的身体感觉和心情低落时一样，很难分辨你是心情低落还是工作太累了。我反复敲门，在外面等着。来吧，史蒂夫，开门。
Sunday. Steve was still asleep at 1:30 in the afternoon. When you're depressed, all you want to do is sleep, and when you're at MIT, you have very little time to sleep, and therefore all you want to do is sleep and your body feels the same as when you're depressed and it's hard to tell whether you're depressed or just tired from all the work. I knocked repeatedly and waited outside. Come on, Steve, answer the door.
大约五分钟后，他终于接了电话。他的眼睛有些昏昏沉沉，说：“哦，是的，我忘了我们的象棋比赛。我们可以改天再来吗？我两点钟要和朗克尔的一个人比赛。不过，谢谢你叫醒我。不然我可能就错过比赛了。”
He finally answered after about five minutes. He was groggyeyed, and said, "Oh, yeah, I forgot about our chess game. Can we do it some other time? I'm going to play a guy in Runkle at 2:00. Thanks for waking me up, though. I might have missed my match otherwise."
“当然可以，我们比赛不着急，祝你和你的搭档比赛顺利。”我回答道，很高兴他有一个朋友。
"Sure, there's no hurry for our match. Have a good match with your partner," I answered, glad that he had a friend.
12 月 13 日
December 13
星期一晚上，在 Lobdell 的自助餐厅，史蒂夫独自坐在我旁边的桌子旁，然后看见了我，拿起托盘，端到我的桌子上。“学习怎么样？”我问道。
Monday evening at Lobdell's cafeteria Steve sat down by himself at the table next to me, then saw me, and picked up his tray and brought it over to my table. "How's the studying going?" I asked.
“哦，相当不错。不过，周四和周五会比较难熬。周四早上我有期末考试，周四下午有期末考试，周五早上也有期末考试。”
"Oh, pretty good. Thursday and Friday are going to be rough, though. I have a final on Thursday morning, a final on Thursday afternoon, and a final on Friday morning."
“哇哦。连续三次。我知道那有多难。一年前我也遇到过同样的事情。你昨天的棋局怎么样？”我问道。
"Whoa. Three in a row. I know how hard that is. The same thing happened to me a year ago. How'd your chess game go yesterday?" I asked.
“哦，相当不错，但没坚持多久。我用了 23 步就将他将军了，用了半个多小时。”
"Oh, pretty good, but it didn't last all that long. I checkmated him in twenty-three moves, a little over half an hour."
友谊就到此为止了。史蒂夫吃得很快，比我还快，好像他因为考试而感到紧张。他吃得太快，以至于面包屑都粘在他的胡子上了。在我吃完沙拉之前，他就把盘子里的食物吃光了。他看起来很紧张，我不想打扰他工作，所以我说：“嘿，别让我打扰你。如果你需要回去学习，你可以随时回到图书馆或任何地方。”
So much for camaraderie. Steve ate fast, faster than I, like he was nervous thinking about his exams. So fast that little pieces of bread got caught in his beard. He cleaned his plate before I finished my salad. He seemed tense, and I didn't want to keep him from his work, so I said, "Hey, don't let me keep you. If you need to get back to studying, feel free to head back to the library or wherever."
他看上去很伤心，好像我想摆脱他，但事实上他可能想坐下来聊聊考试以外的任何事情，直到食堂关门。但他不知道如何用言语表达，而我从他的肢体语言中反应过来的速度有点慢。
He looked hurt, like I was trying to get rid of him, when in fact he probably wanted to sit and chat about anything but exams until the cafeteria closed. But he didn't know how to communicate that verbally, and I was a little too slow to pick up on it from his body language.
他拿起托盘，温顺地说：“呃，是的，也许我最好回去学习。”那时让他坐下就太尴尬了，所以我让他走了。
He picked up his tray and said meekly, "Uh, yeah, maybe I better get back to my studying." By then it was too awkward to ask him to sit back down, so I let him go.
12 月 14 日
December 14
周二晚上，考试第一天结束后。270 进行了一次象征性的期末考试，比赛结束后，这简直是小菜一碟，Bligh 给了我一个 A。再加上暑假 David Miller 的“系统动力学与控制”课程的 A，我第一学期的两个 C 被抵消了，总平均成绩达到了可观的 B。如果我能保持这种进步趋势，也许到博士资格考试（又称资格赛）开始时，他们会将我的第一个学期视为我的第一个学期，我就会有机会进入麻省理工学院，获得博士学位，获得金钱。
Tuesday evening, after Day 1 of exams. Two seventy had a token final exam, a piece of cake after the contest, and Bligh gave me an A. That, plus the A in David Miller's System Dynamics and Controls for the summer, canceled my two C's from the first term, making my overall average a respectable B. If I could keep up the improving trend, maybe by the time the doctoral qualifying exams (a.k.a. qualifiers) rolled around they'd write off my first term to being my first term, and I'd have a shot at M-I-T, P-H-D, M-O-N-E-Y.
我在导师公寓的客厅里悠闲地阅读机械工程系的通讯，看到了一件有趣的事情。
I relaxed in my tutor apartment living room, read through the Mechanical Engineering department newsletter in a leisurely fashion, and saw an intriguing item.
“电子工程、机械工程、物理学专业的学生想参加全国电视节目的永动机揭秘大赛。将选出三名选手与来自伯克利的三人团队竞争。比赛将于 1 月在伯克利举行；将提供往返机票和住宿。请以不超过 1,000 字的字数向位于沃特敦的 Chedd Angier 制作公司提出申请。”
"EE, ME, Physics students wanted to participate in Perpetual Motion Machine Debunking Contest for national television show. Three individuals will be selected to compete against a three-person team from Berkeley. Contest will be held in Berkeley in January; round trip air fare and accommodations will be provided. Apply in no more than 1,000 words to Chedd Angier Production Company, Watertown."
一月份的伯克利比波士顿要好得多。值得一试。如果我被选中，那将是旧简历中非常好的一项。没有规定最低申请长度，而且我很确定无论如何我都不会被选中，所以我会在五分钟内写出一些东西。
Berkeley is a lot more pleasant than Boston in January. It's worth a shot. It would be a really nice entry in the old resume if I'm selected. There's no minimum application length specified, and I'm pretty sure I won't get it anyway, so I'll crank something out in five minutes.
我为什么想成为一名电视明星
Why I Want to Be a TV Star
1.我想要变得富有。
1. I want to be rich.
2.我想要出名。
2. I want to be famous.
3. 我想成为麻省理工学院的教授，这可能会有所帮助。
3. I want to be a professor at MIT and this might help.
4. 我从小就对永动机非常着迷，这对我来说是梦想成真。
4. Ever since I was a child I've had a fascination with perpetual motion machines and this would be a dream come true for me.
5. 我已经知道答案了。要证明某样东西是永动机是不可能的，因为无论它运行多久，总会有一段更久的永动机，而你无法知道这段永动机是否还会继续运行，因为你还没有到达那里。
5. I already know the answer. It's impossible to prove something's a perpetual motion machine because however long it runs there's always going to be some more perpetuity during which you can't know whether it will still run because you aren't there yet.
12 月 19 日
December 19
好了，任务完成了，我们成功了。史蒂夫已经度过了考试周。他很快就会回家，我就可以真正放松了。下午 6:10 电话响了。
Well, the job is done; we made it. Steve's made it through exam week. He'll be home in no time and I can really relax. 6:10 P.M. The phone rang.
“您好，我是沃森先生，史蒂夫的父亲。他今晚应该在家，但他没有上飞机。多尔西教授不在，但他给了我你的电话号码。你能试着找我儿子吗？”他的声音颤抖着，仿佛他担心会发生最坏的情况。
"Hello, this is Mr. Watson; I'm Steve's father. He was supposed to be home this evening and he wasn't on the plane. Professor Dorsey is out but he gave me your number. Can you try to find my son?" His voice was shaky, as if he feared the worst.
“我相信他没事，先生。我昨天见到他了，他看上去没事。我会去检查一下他的房间；然后我会把我的衣服放进去，然后再检查一下他的房间。我会试着找到他，让他给你打电话。”
"I'm sure he's fine, sir. I saw him yesterday and he seemed fine. I'll go and check his room; then I'll put my laundry in and then I'll check his room again. I'll try to find him and have him give you a call."
总数是三票赞成，八票反对。我敲了敲门。“嘿，史蒂夫，你在里面吗？”我更用力地敲了敲门。“嘿，史蒂夫，快点，开门。你爸爸打来电话了，他很担心你。”
The tally mark was up to three yeses and eight nos. I knocked on the door. "Hey, Steve, are you in there?" I knocked on the door harder. "Hey, Steve, come on man; open up the door. Your father called and he's worried about you."
没有回答。我去把衣服放进洗衣机了。
No answer. I went to put my laundry in the washer.
我从东校区洗衣房走回来时看到史蒂夫的灯亮着。以前每次我去看他，他都不在的时候，灯就灭了。如果灯亮着，他肯定在里面。
I saw that Steve's light was on when I walked back from the East Campus laundry. Every time I'd checked on him before and he wasn't there, the light was off. If the light was on he had to be in there.
敲门声。“来吧，史蒂夫。别再玩游戏了，伙计。”我的心开始跳动起来，就像我的实验容器里的压力越来越大一样。敲门声。没有回应。多尔西夫妇周末不在家，所以我去实验室给一位院长打电话。
Knock knock knock. "Come on, Steve. Quit playing games, man." My heart began to beat fast, like when the pressure built in the tank for my experiments. Knock knock knock. No answer. The Dorseys were gone for the weekend so I went to the lab to call one of the deans.
我在迪安·罗宾斯即将去参加圣诞派对之前见到了他。“是的，”他说，“听起来可能是紧急情况。也许你最好给比尔·汤普森打电话让他过来。他是校园里的值班院长。这是他的电话号码。”
I caught Dean Robbins just before he left for a Christmas party. "Yes," he said, "it sounds like it could be an emergency. Maybe you better call Bill Thompson and have him come over. He's the on-campus dean on call. Here's his number."
汤普森院长当时也正要去参加圣诞派对。“我马上就来。你为什么不先打电话给校警？他们有万能钥匙，可以打开他的房间。”
Dean Thompson was also on his way out to a Christmas party. "I'll be right over. Why don't you go ahead and call the campus police? They've got the master keys and can open up his room."
我在史蒂夫的房间门前遇见了两名校警。其中一人拿出一枚上面有大约一百把钥匙的戒指，说道：“应该是这个。”
I met the campus policemen, two of them, in front of Steve's room. One of them pulled out a ring with about a hundred keys on it and said, "It should be one of these."
我的心继续怦怦乱跳，就像在牢房里一样。校警试了一把钥匙。没用。又试了一把。又试了一把。十把钥匙。十五把。第十六把是正确的。天啊，我希望这孩子还活着。
My heart continued to pump like it pumped in the cell. The campus policeman tried one key. It didn't work. Another. Another. Ten keys. Fifteen. Number 16 was the right one. God, I hope this kid's alive.
灯还亮着。史蒂夫躺在床上。一瓶半加仑的杰克丹尼威士忌酒瓶放在床边的地板上，上面放着一堆《阁楼》杂志。校警给史蒂夫检查脉搏。
The light was still on. Steve was lying on his bed. An empty half-gallon of Jack Daniels was on the floor next to the bed, on top of a stack of Penthouse magazines. The campus policeman felt for Steve's pulse.
史蒂夫醒了。他目光呆滞，语无伦次，陷入了深深的迷茫之中。“到底……发生了什么事？”他问道。校警建议我单独和史蒂夫谈一会儿。
Steve woke up. He was glassy-eyed, semicoherent, in the depths of the depths. "What ... the ... hell ... is ... going on?" he asked. The campus policeman suggested that I talk to Steve alone for a while.
“听着，史蒂夫，你爸爸很担心你。你没有开门，所以我别无选择，只能打电话给校警。我们只是想确保你没事。”
"Look, Steve, your father's worried sick about you. You didn't answer your door, so I didn't have any choice but to call the campus police. We just wanted to make sure you were all right."
“我没事，没事，”他稍微理智了一点说道，“你以为你是谁，居然这样闯进我的房间？”
"I'm all right, all right," he said a little more coherently. "Who the hell do you think you are busting into my room like that?"
我还没来得及回答，迪安·汤普森就来了。“史蒂夫，发生什么事了？”他坚定地问道，语气坚定，但又不失同情。“你想做什么？”
Dean Thompson arrived before I had a chance to answer. "What's going on, Steve?" he said firmly, like the rock of Gibraltar, yet with some compassion. "And what do you want to do about it?"
“这些人刚刚闯入了我的房间。我想看看他们的搜查令，”史蒂夫说道。
"These people just broke into my room. I want to see their search warrant," Steve said.
汤普森院长要求在走廊上见我。“听着，”他说，“我要去打电话给他一直在咨询的心理医生，我要你去拿史蒂夫家里的电话号码，然后我们去跟他父亲谈谈。”
Dean Thompson asked to see me in the hall. "Listen," he said, "I'm going to go call the psychiatrist that he's been talking to, and I want you to go get Steve's home phone number and we'll have a talk with his father."
汤普森院长回到史蒂夫的房间。“怀特先生和我要离开几分钟。为了你的安全，我请求校警在我们离开期间留在附近。”
Dean Thompson went back into Steve's room. "Mr. White and I are going to be away for a few minutes. For your own safety, I'm requesting that the campus policeman stay nearby while we're gone."
史蒂夫关上了门。我们回来时门锁上了。校警又开了门。史蒂夫正在和父亲通电话。
Steve slammed the door. It was locked when we returned. The campus policeman opened it again. Steve was on the phone with his father.
“史蒂夫，我想和你父亲谈谈，”迪安·汤普森说。“你能把电话递给我吗？”
"Steve, I'd like to talk with your father," Dean Thompson said. "Will you hand me the phone?"
史蒂夫挂了电话。“没有。”
Steve hung up. "No."
“把电话给我，史蒂夫，”迪安·汤普森说。
"Give me the phone, Steve," Dean Thompson said.
“不。”她更加坚决地回答。
"No," more defiantly.
迪安·汤普森用双手抓住手机，将其从史蒂夫身上拉开，但史蒂夫却抓住了手机，向迪安·汤普森摔倒。史蒂夫恢复平衡，试图将手机拉回来，但他的手滑了，手机壳下面的螺丝割伤了他的拇指，他尖叫起来。
Dean Thompson put two hands on the phone and pulled it away from Steve's body but Steve held on to it and fell toward Dean Thompson. Steve regained his balance, tried to pull the phone back, but his hands slipped and the screw under the case cut his thumb and he screamed.
“你割伤了我。你割伤了我。我要起诉你。”他说着，把拇指放进嘴里吮吸血滴。
"You cut me. You cut me. I'll sue you," he said and then put his thumb in his mouth to suck away the drops of blood.
“佩珀，您有那个电话号码吗？”迪安·汤普森问道，然后他给沃森先生打电话。
"Do you have that number, Pepper?" Dean Thompson asked, and he called Mr. Watson.
“是的，沃森先生，我是麻省理工学院的比尔·汤普森。史蒂夫很伤心，但我认为他不会受伤。”他停顿了一下，转向史蒂夫。“史蒂夫，你想让我们做什么？”
"Yes, Mr. Watson, this is Bill Thompson at MIT. Steve's upset but I don't think he's in any danger of hurting himself." He paused and turned to Steve. "What do you want us to do, Steve?"
“我希望你别来打扰我。二十四小时后，我将成为这里的产物，而不是这里的麻烦，”史蒂夫说，语气稍微缓和了一点。我从导师的急救箱里拿出绷带递给他。
"I want you to leave me alone. Twenty-four hours from now I'll be a product of this place, not a problem for it," Steve said, a little mellowed. I gave him a bandage from my tutor's first-aid kit.
“你想让我们做什么，沃森先生？”迪安·汤普森问道。“好的，如果你愿意的话，我们可以安排一辆出租车明天送他去机场。现在，怀特先生会花些时间陪他。怀特先生和我都要参加圣诞派对，所以接下来的两三个小时我们会很忙，但怀特先生会在史蒂夫从派对回来后和他联系。史蒂夫，你同意吗？”
"What would you like us to do, Mr. Watson?" Dean Thomp son asked. "Yes, we can arrange for a taxi to take him to the airport tomorrow if you'd like. And for now, Mr. White will spend some time with him. Both Mr. White and I have Christmas parties to go to, so we'll be busy for the next two or three hours, but Mr. White will check in with Steve after he returns from his party. Is that all right with you, Steve?"
“嗯？哦。是的，当然了，”他在床上回答道。
"Huh? Oh. Yeah, sure," he answered from his bed.
汤普森院长和沃森先生通完电话后要求再到大厅和我谈话。
Dean Thompson finished the phone call with Mr. Watson and asked to talk to me in the hall again.
“和他聊聊天，或者和他下盘棋，试着让他高兴一点。”
"Just chat with him. Maybe play a game of chess with him. Try to cheer him up a little bit."
“好的，先生，我会尽力的。”我回答道，然后迪恩·汤普森就离开了。
"OK, sir, I'll do my best," I answered, and Dean Thompson left.
兵到王四。史蒂夫是黑棋，我是白棋。
Pawn to king four. Steve was black; I was white.
“那么留在这里有什么意义呢？”他反问道。
"So what's the point of staying here?" he said rhetorically.
“好吧，你在学业上投入了大量的时间，而且你快要完成了，你的父母在你的学业上投入了大量的金钱 - 我的意思是，他们本可以用他们为你在这里所花的钱买一套度假屋 - 而你才刚刚开始把你所学的知识运用起来。”
"Well, you've invested a lot of time in your studies, and you're almost done, and your parents have invested a lot of money in your studies-I mean they could have bought a vacation home for cash for what they've spent to put you through here-and you're just at the beginning of being able to put your knowledge to use."
“对。那么运用这些知识有什么意义呢？”
"Right. So what's the point of putting the knowledge to use?"
“做好数学研究或编写高效的计算机程序。拓展知识的边界。”
"To do good mathematics research or to write efficient computer programs. To extend the frontiers of knowledge."
“那么拓展知识的边界又有什么意义呢？”
"And what's the point of extending the frontiers of knowledge?"
“这样才能开发出改善生活质量的产品。”
"So that products can be developed to improve the quality of life."
“哦，我想你的意思是电子游戏和高清电视。这就是你所说的提高生活质量吗？”
"Oh, you mean like video games and high-definition television, I suppose. Is that what you mean by improving quality of life?"
也许我也需要喝一口威士忌。
Maybe I need a swig of that whiskey, too.
“好吧，这超出了我的专业范围。也许你应该和牧师或者你的心理医生谈谈这件事。”
"Well, we're getting out of my realm of expertise. Maybe you should talk to a minister or your psychiatrist about it."
“我一直在和这两种人交谈，他们完全互相矛盾，这让我更加困惑和沮丧。你还想知道别的吗？你知道有些人的梦是黑白的，而有些人的梦是彩色的吗？你知道我的梦是什么吗？”
"I've been talking to both, and they totally contradict each other and it just makes me more confused and depressed. You want to know something else? You know how some people dream in black and white, and some people dream in color? You know what I dream in?"
“没有，什么？”
"No, what?"
“方程式。就好像我的意识或潜意识中再也没有空间容纳其他任何东西了。没有解脱。没有逃脱。我讨厌这个该死的地方。”
"Equations. It's like there's no room left in my conscious or my subconscious for anything else. There's no relief from it. There's no escape. I Hate This Fucking Place."
“我知道你的感受。但你已经成功了。我相信你考试成绩很好。你的前途一片光明。坚持下去——哦，对不起，我措辞不当。试着再放松一天，回家，几天后你就会忘记这个地方，感到轻松自在，受过良好的教育。”
"I know how you feel. But you've made it through. I'm sure you did great on your exams. You've got a great career ahead of you. Just hang in there-oh, excuse me, poor choice of words. Just try to relax for another day, go home, and you'll forget this place and feel relaxed and well-educated in just a few days."
“将军，”他说。“十二步。你做得很好。”
"Checkmate," he said. "Twelve moves. You did pretty well."
我 11:20 从聚会回来。我给史蒂夫带了一品脱巧克力哈根达斯和一包薄荷米兰诺。这种组合总能让我精神振奋。我想我们一边分吃一边一起看《周六夜现场》。
I returned from the party at 11:20. I brought Steve a pint of chocolate Haagen-Daz and a package of Mint Milanos. That combination had always helped to lift my spirits. I figured we'd watch "Saturday Night Live" together while we split the goodies.
他的门上贴着一张《阁楼》杂志的剪报。上面用粗体字写着一篇杂志文章：“当有人欺骗你时，你会有办法让他付出代价。我会说得更具体一些，但那样做起来就没意思了。”
There was a clipping from Penthouse on his door. In bold print from a magazine article: "When somebody screws you up, you have ways to make him pay. I'd be more specific but that would take the fun out of it when I do it."
敲门声。“史蒂夫，你在里面吗？”敲门声。“史蒂夫，是我，佩珀；我给你带了冰淇淋和饼干。”敲门声。
Knock knock knock. "Steve, are you in there?" Knock knock. "Steve, it's me, Pepper; I brought you some ice cream and cookies." Knock knock.
没有答案。哦不。我们不应该让他一个人呆着。但他是个成年人，他是个大学毕业生，我们必须给他空间，给予他权利。
No answer. Oh no. We shouldn't have left him by himself. But he's an adult; he's a college graduate; we had to give him his space, accord him his rights.
“你好，迪安·汤普森，我是佩珀。他的门上有一张奇怪的纸条，我敲门时他没有回应。”
"Hello, Dean Thompson, it's Pepper here. There's a strange note on his door and he doesn't answer when I knock."
“再给 CP 打个电话，”他说。“我马上就来。”
"Call the CPs again," he said. "I'll be right over."
我给 CP 打了电话，把哈根达斯放进冰箱，下楼再次敲门。还是没人回应。高血压又来了。CP 们，快点，他可能只剩下几口气了。
I called the CPs, put the Haagen-Daz in the freezer, went downstairs, and knocked again. Still no answer. High blood pressure time again. Hurry up, CPs; he may have just a few breaths of air left.
这次警察动作更快，他们知道哪把钥匙是正确的。灯亮着，但房间里空无一人，史蒂夫床边还有另一瓶半加仑的杰克丹尼威士忌。迪安·汤普森来了。“我们不应该让他一个人待着，”他说。“警官，打电话给调度员，让警队进入警戒状态。守住所有楼梯顶部、格林大楼和麦格雷戈的屋顶。派两辆车在 Mem. 大道、哈佛桥和朗费罗桥巡逻。佩珀，你知道史蒂夫长什么样子——你为什么不和这里的警官一起开车呢。我会在查尔斯河这边的人行道上走来走去。”
The CPs were quicker this time, and they knew which was the right key. The light was on but the room was empty, as was a second half-gallon of Jack Daniels by Steve's bed. Dean Thompson arrived. "We should never have left him alone," he said. "Sergeant, call the dispatcher and put the force on alert. Cover the tops of all the stairwells, the roofs of the Green Building and Macgregor. Have two cars patrol Mem. Drive and the Harvard and Longfellow bridges. Pepper, you know what Steve looks likewhy don't you drive with the sergeant here. I'll walk up and down the sidewalk on this side of the Charles."
针对这种意外情况有一个计划。
There was a plan for this contingency.
我和警官一起开车。我们都很安静。我记得失败：放弃物理，在自行车比赛中落后，离开斯蒂芬妮，在麻省理工学院一个学期拿了两个 C。但我还有自己的生活。这一直支撑着我。
I drove with the sergeant. We were both quiet. I remembered failures: giving up physics, not keeping up in bicycle races, leaving Stephanie, two C's in one term at MIT. I had a life, though. That always kept me going.
警官在凯悦酒店门口拉了个 U-tum。“你知道祈祷词吗，孩子？”他问道。
The sergeant pulled a U-tum by the Hyatt. "You know any prayers, kid?" he asked.
“我小时候就学过《诗篇》第23篇，”我说道。
"I learned the Twenty-third Psalm when I was a kid," I said.
“你为什么不试着对自己说，而不是大声说出来。我也会做同样的事情。”
"Why don't you try saying it to yourself, not out loud. I'll do the same thing."
“好的。”
"OK."
查尔斯河平静、冰冷、积雪覆盖的水面旁空无一人，海堤上方的人行道上空无一人。我们缓慢地来回行驶，偶尔停下来眺望冰面。我的脉搏下降了，但我的胸部和腹部感觉像坐过山车一样失重。我试图回忆起这首诗的歌词。
There was no one beside the still, frozen, snow-covered waters of the Charles, no one on the footpath above the seawall. We drove back and forth slowly, stopped occasionally to look out across the ice. My pulse rate went down, but my chest and my stomach felt weightless, like when a roller coaster plunges. I tried to remember the words to the psalm.
当车第七次驶过帆船馆时，调度员通过无线电通讯说：“我们找到他了。他没事。他一直待在学生中心的电视室里。”
On the seventh drive past the sailing pavilion, the dispatcher said over the radio, "We found him. He's all right. He's been in the TV room at the student center the whole time."
我和警官开车去了学生中心，在那里我们遇到了史蒂夫、汤普森院长和警察们。《周六夜现场》快结束了。
The sergeant and I drove to the student center, where we met Steve, Dean Thompson, and the CPs. "Saturday Night Live" was almost over.
“史蒂夫，今晚我们会让你在医务室睡觉，接受观察。然后校警会帮你收拾行李，明天早上开车送你去机场。”汤普森院长语气很是坚定。
"Steve, we're going to have you sleep in the infirmary tonight, under observation. Then the campus police will help you pack and drive you to the airport tomorrow morning," Dean Thompson said authoritatively.
“你知道，史蒂夫，”我尽可能用导师的口吻对他说，“你今晚给很多人带来了很多悲伤。”
"You know, Steve," I said to him as tutorly as I could muster, "you've caused a lot of grief for a lot of people tonight."
“这是我扳平比分的最后机会。”
"This was my last chance to even up the score."
周日上午
Sunday Morning
十点钟，迪安·汤普森打来电话。“他已经在飞机上了。警察毫不费力地把他和他的行李送到了机场。他们一路把他送到座位上，看着飞机门关上，所以我们确信他已经在路上了。”
Dean Thompson called at ten. "He's on the plane. The CPs had no problem taking him and his things to the airport. They took him all the way to his seat and watched the door of the plane close, so we're sure he's on his way."
MIT 的另一件产品已发货。但您有收据吗？
Another product of MIT has been shipped. But do you have a receipt?
章节
C H A P T E R
14
14
永动机
Perpetual Motion
1983 年 1 月 2 日
January 2, 1983
“是的，就是他。”我说。
"Yes, this is he," I said.
“我们希望你能作为麻省理工学院的参赛者之一，参加 1 月 20 日在加州举行的永动机大赛，”制片人说。“我们收到了 30 份申请，争夺三个名额，Chedd Angier Productions 的所有人都同意接受你，尽管你没有亲眼见过。你的申请非常大胆。”
"We'd like you to go to California as one of MIT's contestants in the perpetual motion machine contest on January 20," the producer said. "We received thirty applications for the three spots, and everyone here at Chedd Angier Productions agreed to accept you sight unseen. Your application had real chutzpah."
太棒了。免费去加州旅行。全国性的电视曝光，任何苦苦挣扎的年轻喜剧演员都渴望得到。如果我做得好，去上健美操课，在接下来的两周里举重，并参加魅力课程，也许纽约或好莱坞的制片人会看到这个节目并说，这孩子很棒。让我们签下他来拍一部无聊的情景喜剧吧。”每集 3 万美元肯定比工程师每年 3 万美元的薪水要好。
Yippee. A free trip to California. Nationwide television exposure that any struggling young comic would kill for. If I play my cards right, go to aerobics class, pump some iron for the next two weeks, and take charisma lessons, maybe some New York or Hollywood producer will see the show and say, This kid's great. Let's sign him up for a vapid sitcom." Thirty K per episode sure beats an engineer's $30K per year.
“非常感谢。还有哪些类似的申请让我脱颖而出呢？”
"Thanks a lot. What were the other applications like that made mine stand out so much?"
“其他人大多提交了六页经公证的论文，内容是永动机，附有图表和图画，以及教授的推荐信。过了一段时间，它们看起来都一样了。但你的脱颖而出。我们还根据我们的面试结果选出了另外两个人。其中一位穿着燕尾服戴着红色康乃馨来参加面试。他是一位相当出色的长号演奏家。”
"Most of the others submitted six-page notarized essays on perpetual motion, with figures and drawings, and reference letters from professors. They all looked the same after a while. But yours stood out. We've also selected two others on the basis of our interviews. One of them came to the interview wearing a tuxedo and a red carnation. He's quite an accomplished trombone player."
“听起来像是我朋友的朋友，我每隔一两个月就会在无限走廊里和他聊天。他是丹·瓦格纳吗？”
"That sounds like a friend of a friend, a guy I chat with in the infinite corridor every month or two. Is it Dan Wagner?"
“是的，就是他。另外一位是机械工程专业的大四学生蒂姆·纽伯格。他非常聪明。我之所以选择他，是因为他说他最有趣的智力体验就是阅读《塔木德》。我认为你们三个会成为一个很好的团队。”
"Yes, that's him. And the other one is a senior in Mechanical Engineering, Tim Neuberger. He's extremely bright. I picked him because he said the most interesting intellectual experience he'd had was reading the Talmud. I think the three of you will make a good team."
1 月 3 日
January 3
文献综述。永动机。我参考了 Gyftopoulos 课堂上的笔记。问题集 3，问题 1：“证明第一类永动机的不可能性 (IPMM1)-10 分中的 4 分。”问题 2：“证明第二类永动机的不可能性 (IPMM2)-10 分中的 2 分。”这些都没什么用。我记得问过 Gyftopoulos 教授，你放在一杯水旁边的玩具鸟是否符合永动机的条件。当它的喙进入水中时，它会被水进入喙上的灯芯的毛细作用拉下。然后它前后摇摆，似乎没有能量输入。
Literature review. Perpetual Motion. I referred to my notebook from Gyftopoulos's class. Problem set 3, Problem 1: "Prove the Impossibility of a Perpetual Motion Machine of the First Kind (IPMM1)-4 out of 10 points." Problem 2: "Prove the Impossibility of a Perpetual Motion Machine of the Second Kind (IPMM2)-2 out of 10 points." These will be no help. I remembered asking Professor Gyftopoulos whether the toy bird that you put next to a glass of water would qualify as a perpetual motion machine. When its beak goes into the water it's pulled down by the capillary action of the water going into the wick on the beak. Then it rocks back and forth, with seemingly no energy input.
是的，吉夫托普洛斯教授说过，您说得对，这不是永动机，因为虽然有永动机，但没有将能量从系统中转移出去。
Yes, Professor Gyftopoulos had said, you are right in saying that is not a perpetual motion machine, because you have perpetual motion but no transfer of energy out of the system.
我们还没有见过永动机，也就是输出能量大于输入能量的东西。既然我们没有见过 PMM，我们就说它不可能存在，因为能量（不管是什么）是守恒的。由于能量守恒，所以不可能存在第一类永动机。
We haven't seen a perpetual motion machine, something that puts out more energy than goes into it. Since we haven't seen a PMM, we'll say that one can't exist, because energy, whatever that is, is conserved. Since energy is conserved, there can be no perpetual motion machines of the first kind.
永动机无需输入任何能量即可永久提供动力。第一类永动机“旨在从坠落或旋转的物体中释放的能量大于将设备恢复到原始状态所需的能量。” 一个例子是连接在一起的闭环水车和泵。
A perpetual motion machine delivers power perpetually, with no energy input. A PMM of the first kind "purports to deliver more energy from a falling or turning body than is required to restore the device to its original state." An example of this is a closedloop waterwheel and pump joined together.
如果水车产生的电力大于泵将水推回水车顶部所需的电力，那么水车就可以不靠燃料持续发电。但尽管进行了多次尝试，却没有人设计出能实现这一目标的系统。如果他们设计出这样的系统，波斯湾就只不过是一个令人愉快的度假胜地。
If the waterwheel generated more power than the pump needed to push the water back up to the top of the waterwheel, the waterwheel could generate power perpetually without any fuel. But despite many attempts, no one has devised a system that achieves that. If they had, the Persian Gulf would be no more than a pleasant vacation spot.
大英百科全书的一篇文章描述了永动机的各种尝试：爱德华·萨默塞特，第二任伍斯特侯爵（1601-1667），在 1638 年或 1639 年左右制造了一台机器，并为查理一世和他的宫廷操作了该装置。在同一世纪，荷兰物理学家 WJ 格雷夫桑德检查了法国人奥菲勒斯的机器，并对其构造印象深刻，尽管他不被允许检查机器的内部。格雷夫桑德在给牛顿的一封长信中详细地描述了该装置。
An article in Encyclopaedia Britannica describes the various attempts at perpetual motion: Edward Somerset, second marquis of Worcester (1601-1667), produced a machine around 1638 or 1639 and operated the device for Charles I and his court. In the same century, the Dutch physicist W. J. Gravesand inspected the machine of the Frenchman Offyreus and was impressed by its construction, although he was not allowed to inspect the interior of the machine. Gravesand wrote about the device in a lengthy and detailed letter to Newton.
与我们今天的高科技设备相比，百科全书中的简单图画看起来很原始，但它们看起来和许多 270 设计竞赛机器一样复杂，包括我自己的。
The simple drawings in the encyclopaedia looked primitive compared to our high-technology devices today, but they looked just as sophisticated as many of the two-seventy design contest machines, including my own.
1 月 4 日
January 4
我向杨哲雄请了假去参加比赛，另外还休假一周去湾区骑自行车，在镜头前减肥。
I asked Chet Yeung for permission to take the time off to go to the contest, plus a week of vacation time to bicycle in the Bay Area, to lose some weight for the cameras.
他突然问道：“他们为什么选你？”
He asked abruptly, "Why'd they pick you?"
“哎呀，切特，我不知道；也许他们想让队里的某个人让其他两个人看起来更聪明。”
"Gee, Chet, I don't know; maybe they wanted somebody on the team to make the other two guys look smart."
“是的，我想你可以休息一下。不过我应该去参加。如果他们真的想组建一个团队来解决这个问题，他们就会找我这样的人来，”切特说。
"Yeah, well, I guess you can have the time off. I should go along on that, though. If they really wanted to have a team that would solve it, they'd have someone like me along," Chet said.
我不知道他是否假扮研究生，把自己的名字写在了团队选拔名单上。我回答道：“他们只想要学生。好吧，我知道你看起来很年轻，可以算是一名学生，但你有一个不公平的优势。你很有天赋。”
I wondered whether he'd posed as a graduate student and put his name in the hat for the team selection. I answered, "They only want students on this thing. Okay, I know you look young enough to be a student, but you'd have an unfair advantage. You're gifted."
“是的，不过，尽量不要在电视上说些让研究所难堪的话，”切特说。“让其他人多说点吧。”
"Yeah, well, just try not to embarrass the institute by what you say on TV," Chet said. "Let the other guys do most of the talking."
谢谢您，切特，对我们的信任。
Thank you, Chet, for that vote of confidence.
“哦，是的，但在你走之前，我希望你运行一下我组装的计算机模型，以确保 RCM 模拟真实柴油发动机的冲程。我认为在我们之前操作这台机器的人可能把减震室的组装搞砸了，”切特说。
"Oh yeah, but before you go I want you to do some runs of a computer model I've put together to make sure the RCM simulates the stroke of a real diesel engine. I think the guys who worked on the machine before us may have messed up the assembly of the snubbing chamber," Chet said.
我离开办公室，去找吉夫托普洛斯教授，向他询问有关永动机的参考资料。
I left his office and went to talk to Professor Gyftopoulos, to ask him for reference materials on perpetual motion machines.
“这很有趣。我不知道他们为什么选择你，”他说。
"That's very interesting. I wonder why they picked you," he said.
“他们喜欢我的申请。”
"They liked my application."
“好吧，寻找机器中可能发生不可逆现象的地方。那里肯定会有摩擦，机器中肯定会有能量供应。尽你所能找到这些。”
"Well, look for places where irreversibility may occur in the machine. There will certainly be friction, and there will certainly be an energy supply within the machine. Do what you can to locate these."
格林的态度稍微积极一些。“恭喜，”他说。“能被选为麻省理工学院的代表，我感到非常荣幸。”
Greene was a little more positive. "Congratulations," he said. "That's quite an honor, being picked as a representative from MIT. "
我很高兴有人这么认为。
I'm glad somebody thinks so.
“不过，伯克利的竞争会很激烈。不过那是一个美丽的地方。我希望你能抽出时间去欣赏一些风景。”
"You'll have some tough competition from Berkeley, though. But it's a lovely area. I hope you're giving yourself time to take in a few of the sights."
“是的，我会骑车去那里大约一周。你对如何思考这个问题有什么建议吗？”
"Yes, I'll cycle there for about a week. Do you have any suggestions as to how to think about the problem?"
“是的，那么，看看哪里能量质量下降了。多年来，大多数永动机的尝试都包括从过程中移除能量的部分和将能量放回到过程中的其他部分。问题是，在现实生活中，只要有能量流动，熵就会增加。你还记得你骑自行车的例子吗？”
"Yes, well, look for where there is degradation in the quality of the energy. Most of the attempts at perpetual motion machines over the ages have included sections where energy is removed from the process and other sections where it's put back into the process. The problem is that wherever you have energy flow, in real life you have entropy increase. You remember that with your cycling example."
“谢谢您的帮助，先生，”我说。“演出开始时我会通知您的。”
"Thanks for your help, sir," I said. "I'll let you know when the show is on."
1 月 6 日
January 6
更多的盐矿。切特向我展示了他的 RCM 活塞运动模型，并在实验室的数字（肯·奥尔森，50 岁）VAX 计算机上复制了该程序。切特在一张绿白相间的计算机纸上为我重新绘制了机器。
More salt mines. Chet showed me his model for the motion of the piston of the RCM and made a copy of the program on the lab's Digital (Ken Olsen, '50) VAX computer. Chet redrew the machine for me on a piece of green and white computer paper.
“所以你看，对轴的运动进行建模的想法是为移动的轴写出牛顿第二定律；在运动的每个点上，轴上所受力的总和将等于轴组件的质量乘以当时的加速度，”他说。“我们从油箱中获得了驱动空气压力，然后我们获得了气缸中气体对燃烧室活塞的反向推力，然后我们获得了后活塞拖动并减慢整个速度，这取决于有多少空间。”
"So you see, the idea in modeling the motion of the shaft is to write Newton's second law for the moving shaft; at every point in its motion, the sum of the forces on the shaft will equal the mass of the shaft assembly times its acceleration at that moment," he said. "We got the driving air pressure from the tank, and then we got the pressure of the gas in the cylinder pushing back on the combustion chamber's piston, and then we got the back piston dragging along and slowing the whole thing down, depending on how much space there is."
我记得格林的气球问题，我如何让气球只朝一个方向膨胀。
I remembered Greene's balloon problem, how I'd made the balloon expand in just one direction.
然后我再次查看了 RCM 图并将其翻译成模型语言。
Then I looked at the RCM diagram again and translated it into the language of the model.
切特继续说道：“所以我想让你把机器拆开，确定可用的环几何形状和缓冲活塞直径。然后，我希望你在计算机中改变环的顺序，直到轴的向前运动与真实发动机中轴的运动相匹配。”
Chet continued, "So what I want you to do is take the machine apart in the back and determine the ring geometries available and the snubbing piston diameter. Then I want you to change the order of the rings in the computer until the forward motion of the shaft matches the motion of the shaft in a real engine."
我想知道为什么，或者压缩配置文件的发生方式是否会产生很大影响，或者切特的观点是否是，这是我们可以控制的事情，可以使实验更好地符合现实生活，因此更有用，当我们在底特律发表论文时，问题更少，所以我们必须这样做。这是可以做到的；所以我们就这么做了。但这里还有另一个教训要吸取。
I wondered why or whether it made much difference how the compression profile took place or whether Chet's point was, This is something we can control to make the experiment match real life better and therefore more useful, less questionable when we present a paper in Detroit, so we have to do it. It can be done; therefore, we do it. But there was another lesson to be learned here.
我的任务是拆开机器，测量无心盘的尺寸，将尺寸输入计算机，并调整无心盘的顺序，直到活塞按要求穿过它们，所有操作都在计算机上完成。另一种方法是反复试验，即拆开机器，然后重新组装并测试，直到我们获得相同的结果。
My task was to take the machine apart, take the dimensions of the centerless disks, input the dimensions in the computer, and play with the order of the centerless disks until the piston moved through them as required, all on the computer. The alternative was trial and error-i.e., take the machine apart and put it together again and test it until we achieved the same result.
Chet 已经设置好了程序，所以我只需要输入一个环直径列表，然后看看会发生什么。我在一小时内将 RCM 拆开并重新组装了十次，只需在计算机的输入语句中更改环直径的顺序即可。在现实世界中，工程师一直在做这种事情，因为聘请工程师建立计算机模型并对其进行修改比聘请机械师对金属块进行修改要便宜得多。
Chet had set up the program so I only had to input a list of the ring diameters and see what happened. I took the RCM apart and put it back together ten times in an hour, just by changing the order of the ring diameters in the computer's input statement. In the real world, engineers do this kind of thing all the time because it is much cheaper to pay an engineer to set up a computer model and hack away at it than to pay a machinist to hack away at blocks of metal.
那个星期五我又花了几个小时来破解，但毫无进展。星期一早上，切特说：“别担心这个问题；我周末就把它搞定了。”
I hacked for a few more hours that Friday but I made no progress. On Monday morning Chet said, "Don't worry about that problem; I finished it over the weekend."
“为什么，切特？”我问道。“我以为那是我的工作。你让我开始，为什么不让我完成呢？”
"Why, Chet?" I asked. "I thought that was my job. You let me start it; why didn't you let me finish it?"
“我不想让你再浪费时间了。我们必须在三月份的财团会议之前把机器重新组装起来并进行一些试制。考虑到你一周的休假和即将到来的下学期，我们必须在一月份取得很大进展，”他回答道。
"I didn't want you to waste any more time on it. We gotta put the machine back together and do some firings before the consortium meeting in March. What with your week off and the next semester coming up we gotta make a lotta progress in January," he answered.
这就是切特的风格。事无巨细。我这个学生让切特进退两难。一方面，我参与实验的目的是为了培养我成为一名工程师。另一方面，也许更重要的是，我参与实验的目的是为了获得结果、发表论文、提拔切特为正教授，并保留赞助商的收入来源。
This was Chet's style. The micromanager. Chet was stuck between a rock and a hard place in having me as a student. On the one hand, the point of my working on the experiment was for me to be trained as an engineer. On the other, perhaps more significant, hand, the point of my working on the experiment was to obtain results, publish papers, promote Chet to full professorship, and retain the sponsors' income stream.
因此，当我因为以前没有做过某件事而花费很长时间时，而且我的思维处理不如切特那么精简，他就会介入并帮助我。或者有时，比如周末，他会亲自参与并完成任务。
So when in my lumbering way I took too long to do things because I hadn't done them before and my thought processing wasn't as lean and mean as Chet's, he'd step in and help me. Or sometimes, like over the weekend, he'd jump in and do the task himself.
那天下午，我和尼克按照切特的规格重新组装了戒指。我的感觉和尼克的感觉一样，他执行别人的设计，不知道为什么会这样，报纸上也没有提到，但我知道这比在流水线上工作要好。
That afternoon, Nick and I reassembled the ring assembly according to Chet's specifications. I felt the way Nick must have always felt, carrying out someone else's design, not knowing why it was that way, not being mentioned in the paper but knowing it was still better than working on an assembly line.
尼克把链条放低到位，我把二十个螺栓穿过孔，放入机器上的螺纹孔中。我对他说：“不知道有没有人喜欢这种工作。”
Nick lowered the chain fall into place and I put the twenty bolts through the holes and into the threaded holes in the machine. I said to him, "I wonder whether anyone likes this kind of work."
“您这是什么意思，船长？”
"Whadaya mean by that, Cap'n?"
“那么，你喜欢这种工作吗？”
"Well, do you like this kind of work?"
“当然不是。我必须这么做。这是一种谋生手段，”尼克回答道。
"Of course not. I gotta do it. It's a living," Nick answered.
“我就是这个意思。不知道共产党员喜不喜欢这种工作。”
"That's what I mean. I wonder whether communists like this kind of work."
“别这么说，船长。共产党人很坏，他们不相信上帝。”
"Don't talk that way, Cap'n. Communists are bad; they don't believe in God."
1 月 14 日
January 14
在飞往旧金山国际机场的夜班航班上，坐在我旁边的是一位天体物理学家。他的生活充满传奇色彩：一半时间在哈佛大学从事研究和教学；另一半时间在劳伦斯利弗莫尔实验室从事激光诱导聚变研究。
The guy in the seat next to me on the night flight to San Francisco International was an astrophysicist. He had a storybook life: he spent half his time doing research and teaching at Harvard; the other half he spent working on laser-induced fusion at Lawrence Livermore Laboratory.
“看看那些星星，”他说。“看看它们。你从这里几乎可以触摸到它们，它们看起来如此接近。”
"Look at those stars," he said. "Just look at them. You could almost touch them from up here, they look so close."
我和他换了位置，由于机舱灯光太亮，什么都看不见。
I switched places with him and couldn't see much of anything, what with the glare from the cabin lights.
“你知道吗，”他说，“我们现在做的事情真的很奇怪。我们在一个铝管里，在空中飞行，距离地面六英里。这真是一件奇怪的事情。我不知道后代会怎么想。”
"You know," he said, "it's really a strange thing we're doing right now. We're inside an aluminum tube, traveling in the air, six miles above the ground. It's such an odd thing. I wonder what future generations will think about it."
1 月 18 日
January 18
我骑自行车从伯克利到利弗莫尔去见我来自比利时的朋友，我在麻省理工学院学习的一年半期间，他一直在美国风力发电公司工作。
I bicycled from Berkeley to Livermore to meet my friend from Belgium who'd been working for U.S. Windpower for the year and a half that I'd been at MIT.
“之所以这些装置如此有效，”他说，“是因为一年中大约有八个月的时间，风会稳定地吹过这里的山口。不幸的是，一月不属于其中之一，所以它们都不会对你产生影响。”
"What makes them work well," he said, "is that the wind blows steadily through the pass here for about eight months of the year. Unfortunately, January isn't one of the months, so none of them is turning for you."
我问他：“为什么风只朝一个方向吹？”
"Why does the wind blow one way only?" I asked him.
“萨克拉门托山谷就像一块巨大的太阳能电池板。白天，它升温，空气上升。随着热空气上升，必须用来自某个地方的空气来代替它。来自某个地方的空气是来自海洋的冷空气。它通过这里的山口汇聚而成。”
"The Sacramento Valley is like a giant solar panel. During the day, it heats up, and the air rises. As the hot air rises, it has to be replaced by air from somewhere. The air from somewhere is cool air from the ocean. It funnels its way through the pass here."
我想起了格林的气球问题。海洋就像高压罐。山谷是气球；阿尔塔米拉山口是罐子和气球之间的管道。
I remembered Greene's balloon problem. The ocean was like the higher-pressure tank. The valley was the balloon; the Alta Mira Pass was the pipe between the tank and the balloon.
1 月 20 日
January 20
比赛日。丹、蒂姆和我收到了当天的课程表。丹穿着燕尾服和红色康乃馨，蒂姆穿着普通的格子衬衫和略短的（即高水位）灯芯绒裤。我穿着辛迪借给我的 MITAA（麻省理工学院体育协会）运动衫、蓝色牛仔裤和唐的实验室夹克。根据《波士顿环球报》的一篇文章，运动衫的红色在摄像机上会很好地显示出来。
Contest day. Dan and Tim and I received our syllabus for the day. Dan wore his tuxedo and red carnation, Tim wore his normal plaid shirt and slightly short (i.e., high-water) corduroys. I wore the MITAA (MIT Athletic Association) sweatshirt that Cindy lent me, blue jeans, and Don's lab jacket. The red of the sweatshirt would show up well on the video camera, according to an article in The Globe.
伯克利的团队里有一位麻省理工学院的物理学本科生，他正在攻读天体物理学博士学位，还有两位伯克利本科计算机专家。从他开口的那一刻起，很明显，伯克利的麻省理工学院的人会给我们带来最大的麻烦。
Berkeley's team had one MIT physics undergrad, who was doing his Ph.D. in astrophysics, plus two Berkeley undergrad computer jocks. From the moment he opened his mouth, it was evident that it was Berkeley's MIT guy who would pose the biggest problem for us.
比赛首先由诺贝尔化学奖获得者格伦·西博格博士介绍并掷硬币，西博格博士以分离和识别比铀重的元素（例如钚）而闻名。然后，这台机器的英国发明者和备受赞誉的自我推销者戴维·琼斯博士将简要介绍这台机器。我们将有机会向他提问，然后我们会进入各自的酒店房间进行讨论。那时，我们可以要求任何测试设备，并可以私下使用机器两次。一天结束时，我们将展示我们的结果，琼斯博士将决定获胜者。
The contest would consist of first an introduction and toss of a coin by Dr. Glenn Seaborg, Nobel chemistry laureate, who is best known for his work on isolating and identifying elements that are heavier than uranium (plutonium, for example). Then Dr. David Jones, the machine's British inventor and acclaimed selfpromoter, would present the machine briefly. We would have a chance to ask him questions, and then we would break into our respective hotel rooms for discussions. At that point, we could request any test equipment and would have private access to the machine twice. At the end of the day we would present our results, and Dr. Jones would decide the winner.
在摄像机开始拍摄之前，我们坐在房间里，机器一动不动。琼斯博士用力推了一下，看上去机器全速运转。大约半分钟后，机器停了下来。“嗯。抱歉，女士们先生们，但我想我需要单独和机器呆几分钟。”
Before the camera started rolling, we sat in the room with the motionless machine. Dr. Jones gave it a good hard push, at what looked like its full speed. It stopped in about half a minute. "Umm. Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen, but I think I'll need a few minutes alone with the machine."
除了琼斯博士，其他人都离开了房间。二十分钟后，我们又回来了。这台机器是一个安装在矩形钢架上的旋转自行车车轮。框架顶部有两个香烟盒大小的盒子，里面装着看起来像太阳能电池的东西，框架底部是一个更大的盒子，上面有两个 3 英寸的金属圆盘。在车轮轮毂的两侧，一根杆延伸到一个单独的圆盘上，圆盘与下部盒子上的圆盘相对，上下移动。铜管也对准轮辋，设置的角度可能使车轮转动。
Everyone left the room except Dr. Jones. Twenty minutes later we went back in. The machine was a spinning bicycle wheel mounted in a rectangular steel frame. At the top of the frame were two cigarette-box-size boxes with what looked like potential solar cells, and at the bottom of the frame was a larger box with two 3-inch metal disks on top. On either side of the wheel's hub, a rod extended down to a separate disk that moved up and down opposite the disk on the lower box. Copper tubes also aimed at the rim, set at such an angle that perhaps they could be blowing the wheel around.
掷骰子之前，音响师说：“我发现机器附近的麦克风有静电。”这是一个暗示。
Before the toss, the sound guy said, "I'm getting some static on the mike near the machine." This was a hint.
MIT 队赢得了掷硬币的机会，所以我们问了第一个问题。蒂姆问琼斯博士，或者说告诉琼斯博士，“如果我进入外太空，从太空舱扔出一块石头，它或多或少会永远保持其初始速度。但这不是永动机，因为石头不会向自身之外提供动力。你的机器不会向自身运动之外提供动力，因此根据第一和第二类永动机的热力学定义，你的设备会失效。”
Team MIT won the toss, so we asked the first question. Tim asked, or rather told, Dr. Jones, "If I go into outer space, and I throw a rock from a space capsule, it will keep going at its initial speed more or less forever. But that's not a perpetual motion machine, because the rock doesn't deliver power outside itself. Your machine doesn't deliver power outside its own motion, so in the thermodynamic definition of perpetual motion machines of the first and second kind, your device fails."
琼斯博士大吃一惊。西博格博士轻轻地点了点头。摄像机记录下了这一切。
Dr. Jones was taken aback. Dr. Seaborg nodded his head up and down slightly. The camera caught it all.
琼斯博士回答说：“事实上，这台机器一直在运转。我挑战你来解释一下为什么。”
Dr. Jones answered, "The fact remains that this machine moves continually. I challenge you to define why."
“花了多少钱？”我问道。如果我们对材料成本有一个上限，我们就可以省去一些推进方法，比如在下层箱子里安装一个微核反应堆，或者在房间其他地方安装一个微波接收器。
"How much did it cost?" I asked. If we had an upper bound on the materials cost, we could eliminate propulsive methods such as a micronuclear reactor in the lower box or a microwave receiver from a transmitter elsewhere in the room.
“我花了几百美元购买设备，花费了数百小时的劳作和心血，”琼斯博士的回答引得演播室观众大笑。
"A few hundred dollars in equipment and hundreds of hours of labor and aggravation on my part," Dr. Jones answered to laughter from the studio audience.
来自麻省理工学院伯克利分校的物理学家团队问道：“你已经连续运行它多长时间了？”
The MIT physics guy from Berkeley's team asked, "How long have you run it continually?"
他回答道：“过去几个月里，它已经在多家博物馆展出，展出时间长达三周。”
"It's been on display in a number of museums over the past several months, for periods as long as three weeks," he answered.
我的骑行眼光派上了用场。“车轮不正是因为什么原因吗？”我问道。
My bicycling eye came in handy. "Is the wheel out of true for a reason?" I asked.
“不，这只是运输的压力，”琼斯博士说。
"No. It's just the stress of shipping," Dr. Jones said.
一位非麻省理工学院伯克利分校的学生问道：“整个东西有多重？”我觉得这是一个多么愚蠢的问题。
One of the non-MIT Berkeley guys asked, "How much does the whole thing weigh?" What a stupid question, I thought.
“大约100磅。”
"About 100 pounds."
我们各自去了各自的酒店房间。
We broke for our respective hotel rooms.
蒂姆开始了我们的讨论。“我觉得他对我的第一个问题有点生气。如果我们想赢得这场比赛，就必须想出一个真正正确的解释。不过，音响师的麦克风干扰是一个绝妙的暗示。这些盒子里肯定有一些电磁场相互作用。我们来谈谈晶体管收音机。当我还是个孩子的时候，我常常拿着我的晶体管收音机，在频道之间调音，调高音量，然后把它放在我父亲的立体声音响、冰箱背面、我母亲的吹风机旁边。这让我妈妈抓狂，但我可以通过收音机发出的噪音来追踪空气中发生的事情。”
Tim started our discussion. "I think he was kind of ticked off at my first question to him. We're going to have to come up with an explanation that's really right if we're going to win this thing. That microphone interference from the sound guy was a golden hint, though. There must be some electromagnetic field interaction in some of those boxes. Let's ask for a transistor radio. When I was a kid I used to take my transistor radio, tune it between channels, turn up the volume, and put it next to things like my father's stereo, the back of the refrigerator, my mother's hair dryer. It drove my mother crazy, but I could sort of track what was happening in the air by the noise the radio made."
“好的，”丹说，“我会把它写成我们需要的测试设备之一。管子呢？”
"OK," Dan said. "I'll write that as one of the items of test equipment we want. What about the tubes?"
“它们可能在轮辋上吹气，并提供足够的力量来克服车轮轴承的摩擦力，”我说。“我的一个比利时朋友抽烟很多，我们用他的香烟来观察气流的作用，所以也许我们也应该把香烟和火柴也列入名单。”
"They could be blowing on the rim and providing enough force to overcome the friction in the wheel's bearings," I said. "A friend of mine in Belgium smoked a lot and we used his cigarettes to see what air flow was doing, so maybe we should put cigarettes and matches down on the list, too."
“检查一下，”丹说，“我们先对车轮进行功率分析。我们知道，在琼斯让机器连续运转之前，它需要大约半分钟才能停下来。这意味着当动力没有从任何地方传输到车轮时，车轮的能量将在大约 30 秒内消散。我们可以计算车轮运动的飞轮效应中储存的能量，然后除以 30 秒，以找出克服空气阻力和轴承摩擦所需的功率数量级。”
"Check," Dan said. "Let's first do a power analysis on the wheel. We know that before Jones made the machine work continuously, it took about half a minute for it to come to a stop. That means that when the power isn't being tranferred from wherever to the wheel, the energy of the wheel will be dissipated in about 30 seconds. We can calculate the energy stored in the flywheel effect of the movement of the wheel, and divide by 30 seconds, to find the order of magnitude of the power required to overcome the air resistance and the friction of the bearings."
我觉得这是个好主意。丹也曾在麻省理工学院读过本科。他快速计算了一下，功率需求约为 0.05 瓦。一块相当小的电池或一组电池就能让这个轮子运转几个星期。
Good idea, I thought. Dan had gone to MIT as an undergrad, too. He ran the calculation quickly, and the power requirement was about 0.05 of a watt. A fairly small battery or set of batteries would keep that wheel going for a few weeks.
“好的，0.05 瓦是克服摩擦所需的功率。让我们看看从铜管中喷出的气流是否能提供这么多的功率。佩珀，你是流体专家。你知道该怎么计算吗？”丹问我。
"OK; 0.05 watt is the power required to overcome the friction. Let's figure out whether air jets coming out of the copper tubes could provide that much power. Pepper, you're the fluids whiz. Got any ideas how to calculate that?" Dan asked me.
“好吧，我知道如何计算从管道中流出的能量，以及这与从管道中流出的空气速度之间的关系。我会加上 10% 的效率系数；也就是说，从管道中流出的空气射流能量的十分之一实际上可能用于转动车轮。这是我们在下一个小时内能做出的最合理的假设。”
"Well, I know how to calculate how much power is coming out of the tubes, how that relates to the speed of the air coming out of the tubes. And I'll throw in a 10 percent efficiency factor; i.e., one-tenth of the energy of the air jet coming out of the tube might actually go into turning the wheel. That's as reasonable an assumption as any we can make in the next hour."
我写下了带有许多波浪等号的方程式，意思是“近似相等”；我在夏皮罗的课上学到了一些知识。“这意味着，为了使气流保持车轮转动，空气速度必须达到每秒 3 英尺左右。如果我们把香烟放在烟管旁边，其余 90% 的空气应该会将烟雾吹得非常明显。”
I wrote down the equations with lots of wavy equals signs, meaning "approximately equal"; I'd learned something in Shapiro's class. "So that means that for the air jet to keep the wheel going, the air speed would have to be about 3 feet per second. If we put a cigarette next to the tube, the other 90 percent of the air should blow the smoke pretty visibly."
“那很好，”丹说。他在某种程度上担任了我们团队领导的角色，蒂姆是个非常聪明的人，而我则比较聪明，富有创造力。
"That's good," Dan said. He was sort of taking on the role of our team leader, with Tim the really smart guy, and me sort of smart and sort of creative.
“现在让我们考虑一下这件事可能出现的其他变化，”丹说。
"Now let's consider other ways this thing can turn," Dan said.
“我们需要确定是金属板在驱动车轮，还是车轮通过连杆驱动金属板，”我建议道。“要不要拿来放大镜，这样我就能仔细看看车轮上的连杆。如果是车轮驱动连杆，则连杆行程顶部时连接销位于连杆套筒底部，行程底部时连接销位于连杆套筒顶部。如果是连杆驱动车轮，则情况正好相反。”我从海伍德教授关于发动机轴承的讨论中学到了这个技巧。“我们需要放大镜和聚光灯才能看清任何东西。”
"We need to determine whether the plates are driving the wheel or the wheel is driving the plates via the connecting rods," I suggested. "How about asking for a magnifying glass, and I'll get a good close look at the connecting rod at the wheel. If the wheel is driving the rod, the connecting pin will be on the bottom of its sleeve at the top of its stroke, and at the top of its sleeve at the bottom of the stroke. The opposite will be true if the rod is driving the wheel." I'd learned that trick from Professor Heywood's discussion of bearings in engines. "We'll need a magnifying glass, plus a spotlight for me to be able to see anything."
“听起来不错，”蒂姆说。“我们还应该检查一下这个东西是否从房间里的灯光中获取电力。框架上的盒子上的那些小圆盘可能是太阳能电池。”
"Sounds good," Tim said. "We should also check out whether the thing gets any power from the lights in the room. Those little disks on the boxes on the frame could be solar cells."
我补充道：“是的，如果真是这样，那么我们可以计算出车轮在给定时间内的旋转次数，然后将房间的灯关掉一分钟左右，然后计算车轮在同一时间内的旋转次数。如果它减速，我们就知道它从房间里的灯光中获取能量。”
I added, "Yeah, if that's how it works, then we can count revolutions of the wheel in a given time, then shut the lights out in the room for a minute or so, and then count revolutions of the wheel in the same time. If it slows down, we'll know that it's getting its power from the lights in the room."
丹回答说：“好吧，我们来做一下测试。不过，这有点太明显了；我的意思是，我敢打赌，他把那些看起来像太阳能电池板的东西放在那里只是为了愚弄我们。但我们应该检查一下它的完整性。”
Dan answered, "Right, let's do that test. It's a little on the obvious side, though; I mean, I bet he put those solar-panellooking things on there just to fool us. But we should check it for completeness."
蒂姆说：“那气流呢？也许把它放在房间里，这样空调的空气在它的一边向上流动，在另一边向下流动。或者也许明亮灯光产生的热量产生的气流会冲击边缘的盒子，这样它就会不断转动。这有点牵强，但是嘿，我们在这里集思广益，不是吗？一个疯狂的想法可能会带来一个好的想法。”
Tim said, "What about air currents? Maybe it's placed in the room so that the air from the air-conditioning is going up on one side of it and down on the other side of it. Or maybe the air currents from the heat of the bright lights hit the boxes on the rim so that the thing keeps turning. It's sort of a long shot, but hey, we're brainstorming here, aren't we? One wild and crazy idea could lead to a good one."
“我们可以把一个大塑料袋套在那个东西上，”我说，“如果他们允许我们这么做，而且气流推动它，它就会停下来。我的意思是这符合规定，对吧？我们不会去碰它。除此之外，我们不如拿些冰块、吹风机和熨斗。我们可以移动冰块、吹风机和熨斗，这样我们就可以试着打破稳定的气流，这种气流可能会推动箱子以如此有序的方向移动。这样我们就可以在系统中引入一些熵。”
"We could put a big plastic bag over the thing," I said. "If they let us do that, and the air currents were driving it, it'd stop then. I mean that's within the rules, right? We wouldn't touch it. Barring that, how about we get some ice, a hair dryer, and an iron. We can move the ice and the hair dryer and the iron around so that we can try to break up the steady air flow that might be pushing the boxes around in such an orderly direction. We can introduce some entropy into the system that way."
“好的，”丹说，“我会把‘大塑料袋’写进清单。我们需要一些绳子把它系起来，一些透明胶带把它封起来，也许还需要一些橡皮筋以防万一。还有其他东西需要我们要求吗？”
"Okay," Dan said. "I'll put 'large plastic bag' on the list. We'll need some string to hold it up, and some scotch tape to seal it, and maybe some rubber bands just for good measure. Are there any other things we should ask for?"
“一把大锤子，”蒂姆说，“还有一个意大利辣味香肠披萨。”
"A large hammer," Tim said, "and a pepperoni pizza."
“不过，说真的。还有其他机制需要我们测试吗？”丹问道。
"No seriously, though. Are there any other mechanisms we need to test?" Dan asked.
“如果下面的圆盘在驱动这个东西，而且它们按照某种电容排斥原理运行——你知道，就像你把两个气球在毛衣上摩擦，它们会互相排斥——那么我们需要以某种方式测试一下。不过，我不是物理学家，电磁理论才是原因，所以我不知道如何检查，”我说。
"If the disks below are driving the thing, and they're running on some kind of capacitive repulsion principle-you know, like when you rub two balloons on your sweater and they repel each other-then we need to test that somehow. I'm not a physicist, though, and electromagnetic theory is why, so I don't know how to check that," I said.
蒂姆回答说：“我记得八零二年大一物理课上讲过，两块电容板之间的金属片中会产生感应电流。如果电容板作为电容器工作，即储存电荷，我们在两块电容板之间放一块铜片，随着电容器板电荷量的变化，铜片的电荷量也会变化，这样我们就能测量电流了。”
Tim replied, "I remember something in freshman Physics, eight oh two, about an induced current in a piece of metal between two capacitive plates. If the plates are working as a capacitor- i.e., they store electric charges-and we put a sheet of copper in between the two plates, as the amount of charge varies in the plates of the capacitor, the amount of charge of the copper should vary, and we should be able to measure a current."
“很好，”丹回答道。“所以为了进行这项测试，我们需要一个环形支架来固定铜片，再加上一个电流表来看看我们能否测量到电流。”
"Good," Dan answered. "So for that test we'll need a ring stand to hold the copper sheet, plus a current meter to see whether we can measure any current."
节目制作人走了进来，我们把名单交给了他；丹从便笺簿上读了出来，同时摄像机拍下了他的侧面。
The show's producer entered and we gave him our list; Dan read it off the legal pad, while the camera caught him in profile.
“大约半小时后您就可以进行测试了，”他说。“现在可能是您吃午饭的好时机。”
"You'll be able to do your testing in about half an hour," he said. "Maybe now would be a good time for you to get some lunch."
“这是个好主意，”我说，“您好，客房服务吗？请给我三份芝士汉堡和薯条。”
"That's a good idea," I said. "Hello, room service? Three cheeseburgers and fries, please."
等待食物的时候，我们又聊了一些有关机器的事情，然后蒂姆建议我们需要一些娱乐。
While we waited for the food, we chatted a little more about the machine, but then Tim suggested we needed some entertainment.
“你们更愿意看《综合医院》还是《我们的日子》？”
"Would you guys rather watch 'General Hospital' or 'Days of Our Lives'?"
《综合医院》的投票结果是二比一。
The vote was two to one for "General Hospital."
“汤姆？”朱莉在屏幕上说，“我得告诉你一件事。我要离开你，去找史蒂夫，那个和你一起打高尔夫球的工程师。”
"Tom?" Julie said on the screen. "I have to tell you something. I'm leaving you for Steve, the engineer you play golf with."
“什么？”汤姆回答道。“但我是一名律师。你为什么会看上他呢？”
"What?" Tom answered. "But I'm an attorney at law. What could you possibly see in him?"
“只是他看起来非常......非常......高效。”
"It's just that he seems so ... so ... productive."
音乐。淡出。
Music. Fade Out.
我们吃完汉堡就进去测试机器。
We finished our burgers and went in to test the machine.
香烟测试，阴性。气流测试，阴性。熄灯测试，阴性。查看桌子下面的电线和电源测试，阴性。用放大镜查看轴承测试，不确定。晶体管收音机测试，阳性！蒂姆扫描机器的方式就像麦考伊医生在《星际迷航》中扫描病人一样，每当边缘上的小盒子经过框架上的盒子时，静电就会发出更大的嗡嗡声。
Cigarette test, negative. Air currents test, negative. Lights out test, negative. Look under the table for cord and power supply test, negative. Look at bearing with magnifying glass test, inconclusive. Transistor radio test, positive! Tim scanned the machine the way Doctor McCoy scans sick people on "Star Trek," and the static made a louder buzzing noise every time the little box on the rim went past the box on the frame.
我们没有时间在四十五分钟内设置电流表。这必须在第二次操作时进行。
We didn't have time to set up the current meter in our fortyfive minutes with the machine. That would have to come in our second session.
我们回到房间讨论实验结果。
We went back to our room to discuss the results of our experiments.
“我们知道电力必须在车架上的上部盒子和轮辋上的塑料盒子之间传输，但车架上的盒子如何知道何时打开和关闭？”蒂姆问道。
"We know power must be transferred between the upper boxes on the frame and the plastic boxes on the rim, but how would the boxes on the frame know when to turn on and off?" Tim asked.
“也许机器底部的移动盘和固定盘之间的距离可以通过电力告诉底部盒子里面的传感器车轮在循环中的位置，”我建议道。
"Maybe the distance between the moving disks and the fixed disks on the bottom of the machine electrically tells a sensor inside the bottom box where the wheel is in the cycle," I proposed.
“信息可以通过车架内部的电线传输到车架上的上部盒子。那根电线可以告诉上部车架盒子车轮在循环中的位置。然后它可以打开电磁铁来拉动轮辋磁铁，然后反转极性以推开轮辋磁铁。”
"The information could be transferred to the upper box on the frame through a wire inside the frame. That wire could tell the upper frame boxes where the wheel is in its cycle. It could then turn on an electromagnet to pull the rim magnet and then reverse polarity to push the rim magnet away."
“这很有道理，”蒂姆说，“但如果这些板块真的在发挥作用呢？我们仍然需要进行测试。”
"That's fairly plausible," Tim said, "but what if the plates are doing the work? We still need to test that."
“我们可以在下次使用机器时做到这一点，”丹说。“不过，我也想知道下面的那个盒子里有什么。对此有什么想法吗？”
"We can do that in our next session with the machine," Dan said. "I'd like to know what's inside that lower box, though, too. Any ideas on that?"
“也许我们可以把听诊器放在离它很近的地方，但不要碰它，”我说。“这样我就能听到盒子里是否有机械动作。最坏的情况是，这可能会让我在全国电视上拍一张漂亮的侧照。我可以把它寄给人才中介机构。”
"Maybe we can put a stethoscope real close to it without touching it," I said. "I might be able to hear whether there's any mechanical action inside the box that way. At worst, it might result in a nice profile shot of me on nationwide TV. I could send it to a talent agency."
蒂姆回答说：“它可能不会告诉你任何事情，但可能值得一试。我们的主要目标是将那块金属放入板之间。有人知道如何将它连接起来吗？”
Tim answered, "It probably won't tell you anything, but it might be worth a try. The main thing we should aim for is to get that piece of metal in between the plates. Anybody got any ideas of how to hook it up?"
“它应该和电流表串联起来，”丹说。“不过这有点棘手。我上大二物理实验室课已经很久了。”
"It should probably be in series with the ammeter," Dan said. "That's a little hairy, though. It's been a long time since I took sophomore physics lab."
“是的，如果他们为团队挑选一个双 E 或物理学家而不是我们中的一个，那真的会很有帮助。我的意思是，我们有点被我们领域的狭窄所束缚，”我说。
"Yeah, it would really help if they'd picked a double E or a physics guy for the team instead of one of us. I mean we're kind of trapped by the narrowness of our fields," I said.
丹画了一张草图，画出了如何将电流表连接到铜片上。“我想我们准备好第二次拍摄了。现在要拍什么？《年轻与躁动》？还是《夜之边缘》？”
Dan drew a sketch of how to hook up the ammeter to the piece of copper. "I think we're ready for our second shot. What'll it be now? 'The Young and the Restless'? or 'The Edge of Night'?"
“我一直在追《青春与躁动》”，蒂姆说。“我们可以看看吗？”
"I've been following 'The Young and the Restless,' " Tim said. "Can we watch that?"
制片人在广告间隙叫我们进去。在我们回到房间进行第二轮测试之前，丹说：“等一下。我们进去之前必须做一些黑客式的事情。”
The producer summoned us during a commercial break. Before we returned to the room for the second round of testing, Dan said, "Wait a minute. We've got to do something hacklike on our way in."
“一起吹着《工作时吹口哨》怎么样？”我建议道。
"How about whistling 'Whistle While You Work' in unison?" I suggested.
“我喜欢这个，”蒂姆说。“我们先练习一下，然后再进去。”
"I like that," Tim said. "Let's practice first, then walk in."
我们做得相当不错——当我们从摄影师身边经过时，他微微一笑。后续测试没有任何结果。我通过听诊器什么也没听到，下板之间的环架上的铜片上的电流表也没有告诉我们任何信息。丹站在机器旁边，看起来像拉斯维加斯的轮盘赌庄家。不过，房间角落里的一堆测试设备确实告诉了我们一些事情。
We did pretty well-the cameraman smirked slightly as we whistled past him. Nothing came of the follow-up tests. I heard nothing through the stethoscope, and the ammeter on the copper sheet on the ring stand between the lower plates told us nothing either. Dan looked like a roulette dealer in Las Vegas as he stood next to the machine. The pile of test equipment in the comer of the room did tell us something, though.
示波器，很多看起来像电子器件的大盒子。蝙蝠侠，主场优势真是无敌。伯克利的呆子们可能已经让整个物理和电气工程系的技术供应人员全天处于高度戒备状态。而且由于这是因奥皮（原子弹开发者 J. 罗伯特·奥本海默）而闻名的物理系，他们使用复杂的非侵入式诊断工具的机会比我们多得多。也许我们应该早点来伯克利，和技术人员达成一些协议。
Oscilloscopes, many big electronicky-looking boxes. Holy home court advantage, Batman. The Berkeley dweebs probably had the whole physics and electrical engineering department technical supply staff on full alert for the day. And since this was the physics department made famous by Oppie (J. Robert Oppenheimer, A-bomb developer), their access to sophisticated nonintrusive diagnostic tools was far greater than ours. Maybe we should have come to Berkeley earlier and cut some deals with technicians.
回到我们的房间，伯克利把一张快乐的笑脸贴在我们的门上。我们同意，这太没品位了。我们又把一张皱眉脸贴在他们的门上。
Back at our room Berkeley had taped a happy smiley face to our door. How declasse, we agreed. We taped a frowny face to their door.
“那么，朋友们，我们要说什么呢？谁来说呢？”丹问道。
"So what are we going to say, guys, and who's going to say it?" Dan asked.
“蒂姆是个聪明人。他应该这么做，”我说。“丹，你和我都穿过红色，所以我们已经获得了十五秒的名气。”
"Tim's the smart one. He should do it," I said. "Dan, you and I've both worn red so we've gotten our fifteen seconds of fame."
“你愿意吗，蒂姆？”丹问道。
"Are you willing, Tim?" Dan asked.
“当然可以。我们先想清楚要说什么吧，”蒂姆平静地说。他有当教授的潜质。
"Sure, why not. Let's figure out what we're going to say," Tim said matter-of-factly. He had professor potential.
我说：“让我们把我们确定的事情列一个清单。这就是我实验室的技术员尼克在论文工作中遇到机械问题时一直告诉我要做的事情。”
I said, "Let's make a list of what we know for sure. That's what Nick the technician in my lab has always told me to do when I'm stuck on a mechanical problem in my thesis work."
“好的，”蒂姆说。我们讨论的时候，丹写了这份清单。
"OK," Tim said. Dan wrote the list as we talked through it.
1. 框架上部箱体具有能量传输功能，经晶体管收音机试验证明。
1. Upper boxes on frames have energy transfer, proved by transistor radio test.
2. 房间里的气流没有任何作用，这已通过冰/吹风机测试证明。
2. Air currents in room aren't doing anything, as proved by ice/hairdryer test.
3. 上部箱子上的光电管是假的，熄灯测试证明光电管没有任何动作。
3. Fake photocells on upper boxes aren't doing anything, as proved by lights-out test.
4.空气喷射管只是一种诡计，香烟测试已经证明这一点。
4. Air jet tubes are just a ruse, as proved by cigarette test.
5. 所有电源必须通过电池自行储存在机器内，如下表插头测试所示。
5. All power has to be self-contained in machine in batteries somewhere, as proved by look under table for plug test.
6、听诊器测试，下箱体无较大噪音。
6. No major noise comes out of the lower box, as proved by stethoscope test.
7. 铜测试证明，没有大电流传输到板或从板传输。
7. No large current is being conveyed to and from plates, as proved by copper test.
当我们完成清单时，蒂姆说：“所以我们知道能量是从轮辋上的盒子传到框架上的盒子的。但是，我们仍然不知道框架上的盒子如何知道在正确的时间打开和关闭自己以拉动车轮。我的意思是，如果他搞砸了，框架上的盒子可能会在应该推动轮辋上的盒子时拉动它，在应该拉动轮辋上的盒子时推动它，这样轮子就无法继续转动了。”
When we finished our list, Tim said, "So we know the energy's going from the boxes on the rim to the boxes on the frame. We're still stuck, though, on how the boxes on the frame know how to turn on and off themselves at the right time to pull the wheel around. I mean, if he messed it up, the box on the frame could pull the box on the rim when it's supposed to push it and push it when it's supposed to pull it, and the thing wouldn't keep going."
“那可能就是今天早上它无法启动时发生的情况，”我说道，“我仍然认为它可能与下面的活塞同步。每转一圈，金属板上下移动的次数与轮辋上的塑料盒经过框架上的塑料盒的次数之间存在固定的比率。也许塑料盒内部有一个电路，它从金属板的运动中获取脉冲，并告诉电磁铁何时打开和关闭。机器内部可能有电线以电子方式传递该信息。”
"That might be what was happening this morning when it wouldn't start," I offered. "I still think it might be synchronized with the pistons below. There's a set ratio between the number of times the plates go up and down per revolution and the number of times the plastic boxes on the rim go by the boxes on the frame. Maybe there's a circuit inside the box that takes a pulse from the motion of the plates and tells the electromagnet when to turn on and off. There could be wires inside the machine that convey that information electronically."
“听起来不错，”蒂姆说。
"Sounds good to me," Tim said.
“我也是，”丹说。
"Me, too," Dan said.
制片人敲了敲门。我们三个人回到房间，蒂姆解释了情况，而丹和我坐在后面，对着镜头保持警惕。然后我们走出房间，经过伯克利人进来的路上。麻省理工学院的本科物理专业学生走在前面，脸上带着傲慢的笑容。麻省理工学院队有麻烦了。伯克利又把皱眉的脸放在了我们家门口。
The producer knocked on the door. The three of us returned to the room and Tim presented the explanation, while Dan and I looked keen and alert for the camera as we sat in the background. Then we went out of the room and passed the Berkeley guys on their way in. The MIT undergrad physics major led the way, with a cocky, arrogant grin on his face. Team MIT was in trouble. Berkeley had put the frowny face back on our door.
在“The Match Game”进行到一半的时候，制片人回来让我们坐下来，听听戴维·琼斯博士的评价，看看谁对这件事的解释更清楚。我又一次感到胃里和胸口一阵空虚，那种当你在等待知道自己考试成绩如何、SAT 分数是多少、哪些大学录取了你时的感觉。
Midway through "The Match Game," the producer came back to have us sit down and listen to Dr. David Jones's judgment on who had the better explanation of how the thing worked. I had that feeling in my stomach and my chest again, that hollow feeling you get when you're waiting to find out how you did on a test, what your SAT scores were, which colleges accepted you.
“两个团队都表明这不是一台永动机。虽然两个团队都将推进的主要手段定位在轮辋上的塑料盒中的磁铁和框架上的电磁铁中，但伯克利团队更正确地解释了机器的工作原理，因为他们正确地将整个控制隔离到框架上盒子中的脉冲电磁铁中。麻省理工学院的团队错误地将附在车轮侧面的杆子暗示为某种“控制”机制。”
"Both of the teams have shown that this is not a perpetual motion machine. While both teams located the primary means of propulsion in the magnets in the plastic boxes on the rim and the electromagnets on the frame, the Berkeley team more correctly explained how the machine works, because they correctly isolated the entire control to a pulsed electromagnet contained in the box on the frame. The MIT team incorrectly implicated the rods attached to the side of the wheel, as some kind of 'control' mechanism."
琼斯博士从框架上取下盒子，打开一个盒子放在镜头前。“如你所见，里面有一块小电池，还有一些简单的电子电路，用于控制电磁铁的开启和关闭时间。”
Dr. Jones removed the boxes from the frame and opened one for the camera. "As you can see, there is a small battery inside, and some simple electronic circuitry to provide the timing for the electromagnet to turn on and off."
哎呀。对不起，伙计们。对不起，麻省理工学院。如果我们中只有一个人懂电子学就好了。我真的应该上一两门电子学课；这是当下的潮流。
Dam. Sorry guys. Sorry MIT. If only one of us knew some electronics. I really should take a class or two in that; it's the wave of the present.
琼斯博士继续说道：“不过，你会注意到，我把电磁铁盒拿掉后，机器仍在转动。你看，有一个单独的推进机制，两个团队都没有在他们的解释中提到它。”他露出了和伯克利物理学家一样傲慢自大的笑容。演播室观众对着镜头笑得很尽职。我们尽职尽责地与获胜者、他的同事和机器的发明者握手。
Dr. Jones continued. "You notice, however, that once I've taken off the electromagnet boxes, the machine is still turning. You see, there is a separate propulsive mechanism that neither team addressed in their explanation." He smirked the same arrogant, cocky smirk that the physics guy from Berkeley smirked. The studio audience laughed dutifully for the camera. We dutifully shook hands with the winner and his colleagues and the inventor of the machine.
之后，丹和我坐在酒店泳池边的按摩浴缸里。蒂姆过来坐在泳池边的躺椅上。客房服务送来了茶点——我们仍然在报销费用。
Afterward Dan and I sat in the Jacuzzi by the pool at the hotel. Tim dropped by and sat in the poolside lounge chair. Room service brought the refreshments-we were still on expense account.
“你知道，我们确实让研究所失望了；我的意思是，我对此感到非常难过，”我说。
"You know, we've really let the institute down; I mean, I feel really bad about it," I said.
“是啊，我也是，”丹说。“你能递给我鱼子酱吗？”
"Yeah, me too," Dan said. "Could you pass the caviar?"
“我们差一点就成功了，”蒂姆说，“差一点就成功了。可惜佩珀和我最近才开始控制；要不然，也许我们就不会试图在机器里找控制器了。你知道吗，当我们试图确定这些板子在做什么时，我认为我们找到了另一种推进方法的正确方法。我认为它是一种电容装置，电极性为正和负，因此在循环的某一时刻，它将板子拉向自己，同时将另一块板子推离自己。我们抓住了这一点；如果我们对电和电测试有更多的了解，我们就可以证明这一点。”
"We were close," Tim said. "Damn close. It's too bad Pepper and I took controls so recently; if we hadn't, maybe we wouldn't have tried to find a controller in the machine. And you know what else, when we tried to identify the work the plates were doing, I think we were on the right track for the other method of propulsion. I think it was some kind of capacitive device, where the electric polarity went positive and negative, so that at one point in the cycle it was pulling the plate toward it, while it was pushing the other plate away from it. We caught that; if only we knew more about electricity and electrical testing we could have proven it."
“是啊，”丹说。“不过让我吃惊的是，他们团队里唯一有头脑、唯一能说话的人就是那个天体物理学家。其他人似乎只是随波逐流而已。”
"Yeah," Dan said. "The thing that gets me, though, is that the only guy from their team who had any brains, who did any of the talking, was that astrophysics guy. The other guys seemed to be just going along for the ride."
蒂姆补充道：“他在麻省理工学院完成了本科学习。难怪他这么优秀。”
Tim added, "And he did his undergraduate work at MIT. No wonder he was so good."
“是的，”我说，“三位麻省理工学院的工程师对战一位麻省理工学院的物理学家。别想着伯克利了，这不是一场公平的比赛。”
"Yeah," I said. "Three MIT engineers versus one MIT physicist. Forget Berkeley; it wasn't a fair contest."
章节
C H A P T E R
15
15
哈克特尔因果总和
Hackito Ergo Sum
日程：
Schedule:
1983 年春季：2.01 固体力学（希尔）
Spring '83: 2.01 Mechanics of Solids (Hill)
2.94 固体动力学（林肯）
2.94 Dynamics of Solids (Lincoln)
2.996 论文
2.996 Thesis
2 月 14 日
February 14
希尔教授严肃地站在固体力学课堂上。我身后那排有一张空桌子。“我要告诉你们一个非常不幸的消息。你们班的一位同学昨天自杀了。”
Professor Hill solemnly stood before the solid mechanics class. There was an empty desk in the row behind me. "I've got some very sad news for you. One of your classmates took his own life yesterday."
我当时就想哭，但我和班上所有十九、二十岁的学生一样，强忍着。他为什么要这么做？这个地方到底有什么地方会滋生出绝望、孤独和无助的感觉，让任何人都崩溃？我想起了史蒂夫·沃森的经历；他真的很聪明，但他仍然觉得自己一文不值。我记得门卫艾迪告诉我，第一学期要放松，时不时地找点乐子，这样他就不用打电话给校警，让他们剪断床单、绳子或皮带，然后进行口对口人工呼吸。
I wanted to cry right then and there, but I suppressed it along with all the nineteen- and twenty-year-olds in the class. Why did he do it? What is it about this place that breeds the feeling of hopelessness, loneliness, and inadequacy that could push anyone over the edge? I remembered the Steve Watson experience; he was really smart and he still felt worthless. I remembered Eddy the janitor telling me to take it easy that first term, to have fun now and then so he wouldn't have to call the campus police to cut the sheet or the rope or the belt and issue mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.
希尔教授是一位善良而温和的人，每当我去他的办公室寻求帮助时，他都会耐心地回答我的问题。他继续讲课的悲伤前奏。“拜托。如果你不开心，不要让事情发展到这种地步。来找我谈谈，或者和你的宿舍导师谈谈，或者和“夜线”谈谈，或者和宗教顾问谈谈，或者和精神病科谈谈，或者和你有的朋友谈谈。别忘了你还有一个选择。你可以离开这所学院。它不是世界上唯一一所好的工程学院。事实上，如果你去其他地方，那里的教授们没有那么大的压力来提供研究资金，你可能会接受更好的教育。如果你需要这方面的帮助，请告诉我。”
Professor Hill was a kind and gentle man, who patiently an swered my questions whenever I went to his office for help. He continued the sad prelude to the lecture. "Please. If you're unhappy, don't let it go that far. Come and talk to me, or talk to your hall tutor, or to "Nightline," or to a religious counselor, or to the psychiatric department, or to a friend if you have one. And don't forget one option that you have. You can leave the institute. It's not the only good engineering school in the world. In fact, if you go somewhere else where the professors aren't under such pressure to produce research funding you might receive a better education. Please talk to me if you need any help along these lines."
2004 年，我选修了希尔教授的静力学课程和林肯教授的本科动力学课程。静力学是梁、桁架、桥梁等。动力学是移动的梁、桁架和桥梁，它们在风中来回摇晃。动力学还包括车床、机器人手臂和导弹轨迹。
I enrolled in Professor Hill's class, a.k.a. Statics, and Professor Lincoln's undergraduate Dynamics class, two nine four. Statics is beams and trusses and bridges and things like that. Dynamics is beams and trusses and bridges that move, that rock back and forth in the wind. Dynamics is also lathes and robot arms and missile trajectories.
经过 270 的测试，我知道在与本科生的正面竞争中，A 是可以实现的。我想这两门课程会给我的成绩单再加两个 A。这些课程将成为我博士资格考试力学部分的复习资料。在麻省理工学院，你必须寻找方法制造多弹头分导式导弹，一石多鸟。
After two seventy I knew that A's were attainable in head to head competition with the undergrads. I figured the two courses would add two more A's to my transcript. And the classes would be my review for the mechanics section of the doctoral qualifying exams. At MIT you have to look for ways to MIRV things, to kill multiple birds with one stone.
3月10日
March 10
在牢房里，切特和我准备用新的启动装置进行高压 RCM 点火。
In the cell. Chet and I prepared for the RCM firing at high pressure with the new starting mechanism.
“我还想让你装上燃料喷射器，”他说，“我们可能还不能拍电影，但如果我们燃烧燃料，我们就能有一些数据可以展示给财团。”
"And I want you to mount the fuel injector, too," he said. "We may not be able to make a movie yet, but if we combust fuel we'll have some data to show the consortium."
“但是，切特，如果实验出了问题怎么办？我们为什么不把燃料喷射器关掉，然后我用一块有机玻璃把气缸封上？里面已经有 0 形圈和所有东西了，”我反驳道。“如果一切顺利，我们可以在喷射器就位的情况下进行第二次点火。”
"But, Chet, what if something goes wrong with the experiment? Why don't we leave the fuel injector off and I'll close the cylinder with a piece of Plexiglas? It's got the 0-rings in it already and everything," I countered. "If everything goes well, we can do a second firing with the injector in place."
“我认为这样做很浪费时间，但如果你坚持的话，我们可以这样做。”
"I think it's a waste of time to do that, but if you insist, we can do that."
我的脉搏没有像以前射击时那样高。压力的增加是可以预测的；我知道在什么压力下金属会自行调整。
My pulse rate didn't rise quite as high as it had on previous firings. The pressure buildup was predictable; I knew at what pressures the clunks of the metal adjusting itself would occur.
轰。
BOOOM.
嘶嘶嘶嘶。成功发射后，我释放了储罐内的压力。我又恢复了正常的呼吸。切特和我走到机器前面，海伍德教授打开了牢房的门，看看测试进行得如何。
Hisssss. I dumped the pressure from the tank after the successful firing. I breathed regularly again. Chet and I went to the front of the machine, and Professor Heywood opened the door to the cell to see how the test went.
在我的坚持下，我们装上去的窗户没有燃油喷射器，窗户被打碎了。活塞在更高的压力、更大的力量和更大的动量驱动下，遵循的不是切特的计算机模型，而是牛顿定律和墨菲定律。活塞的预定目的地距离窗户大约一英寸；它的实际目的地在窗户的一半处。如果燃油喷射器还在，它就会被毁坏。
The window we put in at my insistence, without the fuel injector, was shattered. The piston, driven by the higher pressure and the higher force and the higher momentum, had obeyed not Chet's computer model, but Newton's and Murphy's laws. The piston's intended destination was about an inch short of the window; its actual destination was halfway through the window. Had the fuel injector been in place it would have been destroyed.
“我想你是对的，”切特对我说。
"I guess you were right on that one," Chet said to me.
“这会让我们有点吃力，”海伍德教授说。“我们可以修好设备。我很高兴你们俩都没事。去年广岛工业大学的 Mizugachi 实验室的 RCM 爆炸，导致两名研究生丧生。”
"This will set us back a bit," Professor Heywood said. "We can fix the equipment. I'm glad both of you are all right. Mizugachi at the Hiroshima Institute of Technology lost two graduate students last year when their RCM exploded."
“迷路了，教授？”我问道。
"Lost, Professor?" I asked.
“大楼的一半都随他们消失了。”
"Half the building went with them."
谢谢您与我分享这些，教授。
Thank you for sharing that with me, Professor.
1983 年 4 月 4 日
April 4, 1983
十五年前的今天，在孟菲斯，詹姆斯·厄尔·雷用他的大威力步枪瞄准了马丁·路德·金牧师，然后扣动了扳机。十五年前的今天，林肯教授坐在我的办公桌前，和我一样二十五岁。十五年前的今天，他比现在更像少数族裔，因为他成绩优异，开始走上终身教授之路。他有一个梦想。
Fifteen years ago today, in Memphis, James Earl Ray located the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., in the cross hairs of the scope of his high-powered rifle and pulled the trigger. Fifteen years ago today, Professor Lincoln sat in my desk and was twenty-five like me. Fifteen years ago today he was more of a minority than he is now, as he received A after A and started on the path to tenure. He had a dream.
林肯教授站在教室前面略高于地面的讲台桌子上。他身着西装，被《花花公子》杂志评为 1980 年十二位最佳着装男士之一。他的顾问费让他获得了两辆白色捷豹 12 缸 XJ6 四门轿车，全真皮内饰和 Bose（'5 1）扬声器。
Professor Lincoln stood at the front of the room on the table on the lecture platform slightly above floor level. His suits qualified him to be one of Playboy magazine's twelve best-dressed men of 1980. His consulting fees netted him not one but two white Jaguar 12-cylinder XJ6 four-doors with full leather interiors and Bose ('5 1) speakers.
他讲完了上一堂课的主题。“因此，当输入系统的能量频率与你推一下系统时系统前后摇动的频率相同时，就会发生共振。瞧，这有点像你小时候在秋千上荡秋千。”
He finished the topic of the previous lecture. "And so resonance occurs when the frequency of energy input into a system is the same as the frequency that the system would rock back and forth if you gave it one push. See, it's sort of like when you were a child on a swing set."
他画了一幅秋千的草图，旁边还有一些希腊字母。
He sketched a swing set with some Greek letters next to it.
他继续说道：“现在，你还是个孩子，在秋千上摇来摇去。你的父母就像一个钟摆。如果他们扶着你，让你荡来荡去，不推你，你就会每四秒钟左右来回荡一次。这就是你的自然频率，或者有些人称之为共振频率，每四秒钟一次。现在，作为一个孩子，你知道荡秋千的乐趣在于荡得越来越高。而事情的发生方式是，妈妈或爸爸每四秒钟左右推你一下，他们输入给你的能量在正确的时间以正确的方向和正确的速度让你荡得越来越高。
He continued, "Now you as a child on the swing set were a pendulum. Your mother or father was a forcing function. If they held you up and let you swing without pushing, you would swing back and forth once every four seconds or so. That's your natural frequency, or what some people call your resonant frequency, once per four seconds. Now as a child you knew that the fun part of being on the swing set was to swing higher and higher. And the way that happened was that Mommy or Daddy gave you a push every four seconds or so, and the energy they input into you was in the right direction at the right time at the right speed to make you go higher and higher.
“在工程学中，你的问题通常是避免这些共振频率。例如，如果你是一座桥，风使你身上的气压以共振频率变化，你很快就会被震碎。在过去的一两个世纪里，这种情况发生过好几次。另一方面，如果你成为一名乐器设计师，你的任务就是设计始终产生共振的系统。但共振就讲到这里。你们都放下铅笔，好吗？在接下来的讲座中，我不会谈论动力学。”
"In engineering, your problem will usually be to avoid these resonant frequencies. For example, if you were a bridge, and the wind made the air pressure on you vary at a resonant frequency, you'd soon shake apart. That's happened several times in the past century or two. On the other hand, if you become a musical instrument designer, your task will be to design systems that always resonate. But that's enough on resonance. Y'all put down your pencils, OK? For the rest of the lecture I'm not going to talk about dynamics."
班上其他同学都把笔记本和便笺本收起来了。林肯则表现得截然不同。
The rest of the class put away their notebooks and pads. Lincoln assumed a different character.
“你们知道，我永远不会进大学。每天，在我进来给你们讲课之前，那些白人教师们都会把我放下，六天后我才会出来和你们谈话，然后他们就会向我简要介绍情况。”
"Y'see, Ah nevah wint tah college. Everuh day, before Ah come in tuh lecture y'all, the seenyuh white faculty, dey sets me down, and dey briefs me foe six houwuhs befoe ah comes out to talks to y'all."
班上八十人，除了二月份离开希尔教授的班、离开研究所、离开地球的人以外，传出了一两声笑声，气氛有些紧张。
There was a chuckle or two, and sort of a tense air in the class of eighty minus the one who left Professor Hill's class and the institute and Earth in February.
“不过说真的，”他继续说道，“麻省理工学院是一个种族主义和性别歧视的机构。你们可能会问自己，‘为什么它不应该这样呢？这个国家，也就是世界上的其他机构也都是这样，’但这不是重点。现在你们在这里，我想给你们举几个例子来说明我的观点。”
"But seriously, though," he continued. "MIT is a racist, sexist institution. You may ask yourselves, 'Why shouldn't it be; so is every other institution in this country, that means in the world,' but that's not the point. You are here now, and I want to give you some examples of the point I'm trying to make."
笑声消失了，取而代之的是冰冷的沉默。
The chuckles disappeared and were replaced by stone cold silence.
“我给过你们一些如何解拉格朗日方程的例子。当我和你们差不多大的时候，我在本科和研究生阶段都选修过物理系和电子工程系的这门课。我甚至还选修过数学系的两门课，这两门课是这门课的基础。在大三和大四之间的那个暑假，我白天、晚上和周末为我的一位教授做研究，我做了我遇到的每一个问题。我编造了自己的问题并解决它们。我想彻底掌握如何在现实世界中应用这些方程的每一个方面、每一个方面、每一个细微之处、每一个特殊情况。”
"I've given you examples of how to solve Lagrange's equations. When I was about your age, I took the Physics department's equivalents of this class, and I took the Electrical Engineering department's equivalents of this class, in both cases at the undergraduate and graduate level. I even took two classes in the Mathematics department that formed the underpinnings of the material. During the summer between junior and senior year when I did research for one of my professors during the day, at night and on weekends, I did every problem I put my hands on. I made up my own problems and did them. I wanted to thoroughly master every aspect, every facet, every subtlety, every special case of how to apply these equations in the real world."
他停顿了一下。“我一直坚持这个项目直到圣诞节前，刚好是课程结束后，当我完成后，我想和别人分享一下。我把这本书拿给我的导师看，他说，‘你刚才做的是把方程式简化为一组机械的求解程序。这没什么特别的。二十年后，一台愚蠢的计算机也能做你做的事情。’我问你，你认为如果我和你们大多数人一样是个老乡，他会这样回答吗？”
He paused. "I kept up the project to just before Christmas time, just after the end of classes, and when I was done, I wanted to share it with someone. I showed the book to my adviser, and he said, 'What you've just done is trivialize the equations to a set of mechanical solution procedures. There's nothing special to that at all. In twenty years a dumb computer will be able to do what you've done.' I ask you, do you think he would have responded that way if I were a homeboy like most of you?"
不，我想。他的导师肯定听过肖克利（1936 年博士）的指控，即黑人在基因上低劣。种族主义科学家占据了巫师般的权力位置，凭借他们比我们其他人更聪明的事实，他们对我们撒谎，我们几乎无力辩论，更不用说反驳了。
No, I thought. His adviser must have heard Shockley's (Ph.D. '36) allegation that blacks are genetically inferior. Racist scientists take their wizardly positions of power, and by virtue of the fact that they're smarter than the rest of us, they tell us lies that we are nearly powerless to debate, much less disprove.
林肯继续说道：“所以我拿着那本笔记本，那是我花了两年多时间在夜晚和周末准备的，我去了高级宿舍院子里的篝火旁，把它扔在那里，一边哭一边看着它燃烧。所以你们必须自己制作笔记本，自己寻找解决方案。”
Lincoln continued, "So I took that notebook binder, that one that I'd prepared during more than two years of nights and weekends, and I went to the bonfire in the Senior House courtyard, and I threw it in there and watched it burn while I cried. So you will have to make your own notebooks and pioneer those solutions yourselves."
然后他直视着我的眼睛，有一瞬间我感到很不舒服。
Then he looked at me, straight in the eye, for an uncomfortable second.
“现在，我想给你们举一个更近的例子。几周前，我给你们讲授了机电系统中的磁通链。你们中的一个人用那种‘难倒教授’的语气问了一个问题，那种语气表明你们正在寻找报复的机会，因为我是黑人，所以你们认为我可能很容易被击中。你们中的一个人让我推导出方程的电方面，而我们机械工程师通常不会记住这一方面。但即使我烧毁了我的笔记本，我还是内化了这些知识，你们可能还记得，我给出了一个完整、正确的推导。”
"Now, I'd like to give you a more recent example. A few weeks ago, I lectured to you about flux linkage in an electromechanical system. One of you asked a question in that 'stump the professor' tone of voice, the kind that shows you're looking for a chance to get even, and since I'm black you thought I might be an easy hit. One of you asked me to derive the electrical side of the equation, the side that we mechanical engineers wouldn't normally have committed to memory. But even though I burned my notebook, I had internalized the knowledge, and as you may recall, I presented a complete, correct derivation."
我低头看着地板，将手肘撑在桌子上，用手捂住额头，以避免进一步的目光接触。他在谈论我。
I looked down at the floor, put my elbow on the desk and my hand across my forehead so as to avoid any further eye contact. He was talking about me.
“我并不是要求你们改变世界。我只是要求你们考虑放下偏见的可能性，”他补充道。“现在天气很好。你们为什么不在课堂剩余时间出去散步呢？我们可以在下一个下雨天补上讲课内容。”
"I'm not asking you all to change the world. I'm just asking you to consider the possibility of laying aside your prejudices," he added. "Now, it's a beautiful day. Why don't you all go out and take a walk for the rest of the class time. We can make up the lecture material on the next rainy day."
4 月 20 日
April 20
“嘿，佩珀，我想跟你谈谈，”埃尔登·泰瑞尔说着，用手指敲打着我公寓门旁边的墙壁，就像在打字一样。埃尔登是阿特金森大一新生之一，住在我家楼下。我们都很喜欢辛迪，他能制作出很棒的声音效果，比如一把装有消音器的机关枪，以及《星球大战》中卢克·天行者和达斯·维达决斗时使用的嗡嗡作响的虚拟剑。我第一次见到他是在迎新周，当时两个大三学生正试图把他赶出房间。
"Hey, Pepper, I want to talk to you about something," Eldon Tyrell said, drumming his fingers in a typing motion on the wall next to the door to my apartment. Eldon was one of the Atkinson freshmen, who lived down the hall from me. We both had a crush on Cindy, and he did fine vocal sound effects of, for example, a machine gun with a silencer on it and the buzzing virtual swords that Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader dueled with in Star Wars. I'd first met him when two juniors were trying to bully him out of his room during orientation week.
埃尔登主修航空航天专业，涉及流体力学，这是我的强项，我们成了朋友——好到我都向他吐露我的文学抱负。他成了我在这方面的盟友和线人。
Eldon was an aero-astro major, which involved fluid mechanics, my forte, and we'd become friends-good enough friends that I'd confided my literary ambitions to him. He became an ally on that front, an informant.
“当然可以，孩子，进来吧，”我用我最好的博加特嗓音说道。
"Sure, kid, come on in," I said in my best Bogart voice.
他坐在我办公桌末端旁边的椅子上，就像客户在私家侦探办公室里坐的椅子一样，是一把黑色的木质学院式办公椅，我则坐在带脚轮的绿色瑙加海德扶手转椅上，把脚搁在桌子上。
He sat in the chair next to the end of my desk, like the chair the client sits in in the private eye's office, a black wooden instituteissue desk chair, and I sat back in the green Naugahyde arm-swivelchair on casters and put my feet up on the desk.
“哦，孩子，你对谢伊有什么看法？”我问他。
"Sho, whadaya got to shay, kid?" I asked him.
“等一下，灯光不对，”他回答道。“我们需要你从传热实验室办公室拿来的装饰艺术风格的台灯，它指向我们之间的桌子角落，这样我们一半在明亮的光线下，一半在阴影中。好了。让我把顶灯关掉。这样更适合这种气氛。”
"Wait a minute, the lighting's not right," he answered. "We need the art deco desk lamp you swiped from your office in the heat transfer lab sort of pointing away from the corner of the desk between us so we're half in bright light, half in shadow. There. And let me turn off the overhead light. That fits the mood much better."
“嘿，孩子，你对谢伊有什么看法？”我在第二次拍摄时问他。
"Sho, whadaya got to shay, kid?" I asked him in take two.
“来，我给你看一下这个。我刚刚被录取了。我终于进入了 THA。这真是太棒了；我真的很兴奋。他们昨天才通知我。来，看看这个。”
"Here, let me show you this. I was just accepted. I'm finally in THA. It's so amazing; I'm really psyched. They just let me know yesterday. Here, look at this."
他在桌子上的亮处放了一张纸。纸的顶部印着“鹰之下”，一只白头鹰的左翼和头部构成了信头。左边空白处竖着写着“限制”，底部空白处用小号字体写着“出于安全原因，请勿向宿舍里的任何人展示此文件。技术黑客协会。”
He put a sheet of paper on the desk in the bright part. At the top of the sheet was printed "Under the Eagle," and the left wing and head of a bald eagle completed the letterhead. The left margin said vertically, "Restricted," and the bottom margin said in fine print, "For security reasons, do not show this to anyone else in your dormitory. The Technology Hackers Association."
高质量的印刷文本包含几条公告。“即将在沿着运动场旁边的阿默斯特巷行驶的公交车上举行 Hack。用外科手术管水球攻击这些肮脏的野兽；请不要用肥皂 - 我们不想激怒公交公司……可能会向示威者投掷粉色水球……毕业典礼上的 Impossible Hack；Dekes 在 HY 比赛中用气球舀起我们。Impossible Hack 一定很棒。”
The high-quality printed text had several announcements. "Coming Hack on the buses that drive down Amherst Alley next to athletic field. Attack the dirty beasts with surgical tubing water balloons; no soap, please-we don't want to anger the bus company.... Possibility of pink water balloon throw at demonstrators. ... Impossible Hack at graduation; the Dekes scooped us with the balloon at the H-Y game. Impossible Hack must be good."
我问埃尔登，这个不可能的 Hack 计划是什么。
I asked Eldon what the impossible Hack plan was.
“我不能透露细节；我是说，我已经告诉你这么多了，我真想枪毙你。就说我们要挫败西德特勤局的安全扫荡吧。你看，前西德总理赫尔穆特·施密特计划在大约一个月后在毕业典礼上发表演讲。我们正计划进行一次黑客攻击，让其中一些人丢掉工作。不过，这不会很容易。我们要对付的是盖世太保的儿子和孙子，这些人很厉害。但我认为我们能做到。我的意思是，我们的父母和祖父母赢得了战争，不是吗？”
"I can't divulge details; I mean, I'm already telling you so much I should shoot you. Let's just say we're going to defeat the West German Secret Service security sweep. See, Helmut Schmidt, the former West German chancellor, is scheduled to speak at graduation in about a month. We're planning a hack that's going to cost a few of those guys their jobs. It's not going to be easy, though. We're dealing with the sons and grandsons of the Gestapo, and these guys are good. But I think we're up to it. I mean, our parents and grandparents won the war, didn't they?"
“是的。”我不再扮博加特，重新做回自己。我把脚从桌子上拿开，在椅子上向前倾身。“粉色水球呢？”
"Yeah." I stopped being Bogart, started being myself again. I took my feet off the desk and leaned forward in the chair. "What about the pink water balloons?"
“嗯，这一点我不太引以为豪。这些人中有些人真的是法西斯主义者。我的意思是，我并不赞同他们所做的一切。你知道麻省理工学院是如何获得 Simplex 拥有的所有土地的，他们是如何拆除所有出租单位，让大量贫穷的剑桥港居民无家可归，然后他们将建造研发办公空间，而到他们完工时，这些办公空间可能只是波士顿市场日益增加的办公空间过剩的面积的增加，到那时，波士顿市场可能就会出现这种情况？”他反问道。
"Well, that one I'm not too proud of. Some of these guys are really fascists. I mean, I don't agree with everything they do. You know how MIT has acquired all that land owned by Simplex, and how they're going to tear down all those rental units and make a whole lot of poor Cambridgeport residents homeless, and then they're going to build R&D office space that by the time they're through will probably be just an addition of square footage to a growing office space glut that will probably occur in the Boston market by then?" he asked rhetorically.
“是的。”我回答。
"Yes," I answered.
“嗯，麻省理工学院的高层想从他们示威地点附近的建筑屋顶上向他们扔粉色水球，”他说。“我不太确定这是不是一个好主意。示威者可能会认为麻省理工学院让我们这么做，然后他们会更加讨厌麻省理工学院。我的意思是，这就是那些扭曲、偏执的左派人士看待事物的方式。”
"Well, the THA brass wants to throw pink water balloons at them from the roofs of the buildings near where they're demonstrating," he said. "I'm not so sure it's a good idea. The demonstrators will probably figure MIT put us up to it and then they'll hate the institute even more. I mean that's how those warped, paranoid leftists look at things."
“也许随着你在组织中晋升，你可以从内部改变它，”我说。“但除此之外，告诉我更多关于你参与的事情。申请程序是怎样的？”
"Maybe as you advance in the organization you can change it from within," I said. "But aside from that, tell me more about your involvement. What was the application procedure?"
我给了他一杯冰水后，他主动回答了我的问题。
He offered to answer after I gave him a glass of ice water.
“这些人组织严密，”他说。“他们给了我这份表格；我是说一份打印的表格，就像你填写的工作申请表一样，比如政府工作申请表。它问了各种个人问题，比如我在高中时做过哪些黑客工作，我的政治信仰是什么，还有很多其他个人问题，这些问题我都不想让组织外的任何人看到。这有点像耶鲁的骷髅会。不同之处在于，你必须聪明才能进入 THA，你必须是贵族才能进入骷髅会。不管怎样，我签了申请表，所以他们抓住了我。例如，如果他们发现我违反了保密誓言，他们所要做的就是将我的申请表发送给我的雇主，然后我就会被解雇。”
"These guys are incredibly organized," he said. "They gave me this form; I mean a printed form, just like you'd fill out for a job application, like for the government or something. It asked all kinds of personal questions, like what kinds of hacks I'd done in high school, what my political convictions were, and a lot of other personal questions, things I wouldn't want anyone outside the organization to see. It's sort of like Skull and Bones at Yale. The difference is that you have to be smart to get into THA, and you have to be a landed gentry blueblood to get into Skull and Bones. Anyway, I signed the application, so they've got me. If they find out I violated the confidentiality oath, for example, all they'll have to do is send my application form to my employer, and I'll be sunk."
“别担心，我会给你改名的，”我说，“这次行动听起来就像是我读到的情报机构的报道。”
"Don't worry, I'll change your name," I said. "The operation sounds like what I've read about intelligence organizations."
“你最好相信，”埃尔登回答道。“他们有部门主管，什么都有。甚至还有情报部长。他们有档案，记录清洁工何时打扫教室，以及 CP 的巡逻情况。这样他们就知道如何制造转移。如果他们要进行黑客攻击，一个小组将在远离 CP 巡逻范围的区域制造转移。X 个 CP 将调查转移，而需要撬门或破门而入的门将没有热量。情报部长还会四处收集其他随机信息；他会偷听谈话，诸如此类。这有点恶心，但真的很有趣。我很享受在某人家里安装窃听器或窃听某人的电话。”
"You better believe it," Eldon answered. "They've got section heads and everything. There's even a minister of intelligence. They have files on when the janitors clean the classrooms and what the rounds of the CPs are. That way they know how to create a diversion. If they're going to do a hack, one team will create a diversion in an area away from the CPs' beat. X number of CPs will investigate the diversion, and the door that has to be picked or broken into will be free of heat. The minister of intelligence also goes around collecting other random information; he listens in on conversations, things like that. It's kind of sick but it's really fun. I could enjoy putting bugs into someone's house or tapping someone's phone."
“并且剥夺你努力守护的自由吗？”我问道。
"And take away some of the freedom you're working to protect?" I asked.
“听着。这无所谓。如果你发现的只是丈夫不忠而妻子不知道，那又怎么样呢？你不会利用这些信息做任何事情。这就像森林里倒下的一棵老树，不是一个好主意。我真的可以玩得开心。但我永远不会杀人。但天哪，我可能走上了中情局的职业道路，五年后我可能会杀人，我不相信这一点。”
"Look. It doesn't matter. So what if all you find out is that the husband is being unfaithful and the wife doesn't know it. You won't do anything with that information. It's the old tree falling in the forest not making a sound idea. I could really have fun with this. I'd never kill anyone though. But gosh, I'm probably on a CIA career track and in five years I might be killing people and I don't believe in that."
我回答说：“别担心。你不会杀死任何人。无论如何不会直接杀死任何人。”
I responded, "Don't worry about it. You won't kill anyone. Not directly anyway," I said.
“无论是直接还是间接，我都不喜欢它。它违背了我的宗教信仰。不过，我认为你是对的。他们可能把所有的暗杀任务都外包出去了。我非常肯定，从 THA 到 CIA 之间有一条管道，就像骷髅会一样。例如，我们有 OSS 的撬锁指南。战略服务办公室……他们是 CIA 的前身。”
"Directly or indirectly, I don't like it. It's against my religion. I think you're right, though. They probably subcontract all the hits. I'm pretty sure there is a pipeline from THA to the CIA, just like there is with Skull and Bones. For example, we have the OSS guide to lockpicking. The Office of Strategic Services ... they were the precursor of the CIA."
“是的，但现在这是一份公开文件了。你也许可以从国家技术信息服务处订购它，”我反驳道。
"Yeah, but that's a public document by now. You can probably order it from the National Technical Information Service," I countered.
“随便吧。不过你应该看看。里面有各种各样的花招。你看，撬锁的蛮力方法是把一个他们称之为耙子的东西放进去。但耙子的问题在于，你可以把光照射到钥匙孔里，判断锁是否被撬了。所以还有另一种带钩子的小工具。”
"Whatever. You should see it, though. It has all kinds of tricks in it. See, the brute force way to pick a lock is to put this thing they call a rake into it. But the problem with the rake is that you can shine a light into the keyhole and tell whether the lock has been picked. So there's this other little tool with a hook in it."
他从口袋里掏出钥匙链，向我展示了一小片金属，看起来有点像瑞士军刀的开罐器。
He took his keychain out of his pocket and showed me a short piece of metal that looked sort of like a can opener from a Swiss army knife.
埃尔登继续解释道：“你每次只能挑一个球，没有人知道具体怎么做。一些资深的中情局人员可以在十五秒内挑七个球。挑、拉、转动手柄，挑、拉、转动手柄，直到你中奖为止。”
Eldon continued the explanation. "You just pick one pin at a time, and no one knows anything about it. Some veteran CIA guys can pick seven pins in fifteen seconds. It's pick, pull, turn handle, pick, pull, turn handle, until bingo you're in."
“CP们不觉得你们很烦吗？”我问。
"Don't the CPs find you guys annoying?" I asked.
“不是。我们的章程规定我们不能造成任何破坏。有一次，有人闯入绿色大楼顶部，偷走了防空警报器。CP 以为是 THA 干的，但其实是一些卑鄙的兄弟会成员。THA 开始了一项小任务，第二天归还了警报器，并附上一张纸条，上面写着“THA 提供”。此外，对于门和锁，我们绝不会用钳子或虎钳攻击它们。如果黑客攻击需要拆除整个门把手，然后再重新组装，我们就会这么做。这就是我们的运作方式。”
"Not really. It's in our constitution that we can't do any damage. One time some group broke into the top of the Green Building and stole the air raid warning sirens. The CPs thought it was THA, but it was actually some sniveling frat boys. THA embarked on a little mission and returned the sirens the next day, with a note saying, 'Courtesy THA.' Plus, with doors and locks, we never attack them with pliers or vice grips. If the hack requires removing an entire door handle and then reassembling it later, that's what we'll do. That's just the way we operate."
“你已经入侵了吗？”
"Have you hacked yet?"
“是的。前几天我刚执行了一项任务。我们入侵了图书馆的圆顶。这真是太神奇了。我们在会议室开会，回顾了我们的所有任务，以及我们发送和接收的信号，以确保一切顺利。我们同步了手表，然后当我们沿着走廊走时，小组组长在几个地方看到角落里有一只不知名的手作为信号，我的意思是时间恰到好处。我们继续前进，爬上了圆顶的顶部，在那里野餐。真是太棒了，我的意思是凌晨三点的查尔斯河、剑桥和麻省理工学院的景色真是太美了。这是一次入门级的入侵。我不知道哪个圆顶入侵更难，是他们在那里放了一个电话亭，当 CP 上去检查时电话响了，还是我们在那里放了一头活牛。”
"Yeah. I just went on a mission the other day. We hacked the dome in the library. It was just so amazing. We met in a conference room and reviewed all our tasks and what signals we'd send and receive to know that the coast was clear. We synchronized our watches and then when we were walking down the corridor the group leader saw just an anonymous hand around a corner as a signal at a couple of places, I mean with perfect timing. We went ahead and climbed to the top of the dome and had sort of a picnic up there. It was awesome, I mean what a view at three in the morning of the Charles and all of Cambridge and MIT. It was a starter hack. I don't know which dome hack was tougher, the one when they put a phone booth up there and the phone rang when the CPs went up to check it out, or when we put a live cow up there."
“把牛放在那里太残忍了，”我说。
"It's cruel to put a cow up there," I said.
“其实不然；你看，牛不会走下坡路，所以牛不会伤害自己。无论如何，在我们完成黑客攻击后，我们在预定的时间回到会议室讨论结果。这很棒。我的意思是，这太有趣了，甚至有点可怕。想想看；很多 CIA 的人都是过度的黑客，他们认为这是一场游戏。就像他们说的，‘好吧，伙计们，该为总统做点小工作了’，当然总统对此一无所知。我几乎可以肯定公司在这里招募新员工。”
"Not really; see, cows don't walk downhill, so there wasn't any danger of the cow's hurting itself. Anyway, after we were done with the hack we met back at the conference room at the prearranged time to discuss the results. It was great. I mean it was so much fun it's scary. And just think; a lot of the CIA guys are just overgrown hackers and they think it's a game. Like they say, 'OK boys, time to do a little job for the prez,' and of course the prez would know nothing about it. I'm almost sure the Company recruits here."
我削尖了铅笔。“这真有趣，”我说。“中央情报局是公司，麻省理工学院由企业经营。我想我发现了一种趋势。”
I sharpened my pencil. "That's interesting," I said. "The CIA is the Company, MIT is run by the Corporation. I think I detect a trend."
“是的，但是你最好不要写这个。”
"Yeah, but you better not write that."
“为什么不？”
"Why not?"
“因为你可能会失去校友运动特权。或者没有雇主愿意雇佣你。或者这可能会对你的信用评级产生不利影响。”
"Because you could lose your alumni athletic privileges. Or no employer will touch you. Or it might adversely affect your credit rating."
“噢，得了吧，埃尔登，只有苏联人才会担心这种事。我们这里有言论自由。”
"Aw, come on, Eldon, people only worry about that kind of thing in the Soviet Union. We have freedom of speech here."
“是的，当然，我们可以打印任何我们想要的裸体照片，但如果你让人们认为你可能会被贴上颠覆分子的标签。我只是说要小心。顺便说一句，不要对任何激进的原教旨主义“宗教”团体大肆抨击。你不会想把你的余生都花在从一个安全屋转移到另一个安全屋上吧。”
"Yeah, sure, we can print whatever naked bodies we want, but if you make people think you might be labeled a subversive. All I'm saying is be careful. And by the way, don't flame about any radical fundamentalist 'religious' groups. You don't want to spend the rest of your life moving from safe house to safe house."
“太晚了，我刚刚才这么做。跟我多讲讲 THA 的情况。”
"It's too late; I just did. Tell me more about THA."
“抱歉，我不知道了。协会采用蜂窝网络组织，所以我只认识协会中的另外四个人。在我晋升之前，情况会一直如此。”
"Sorry, I don't know any more. It's organized in a cellular network, so I only know four other people in the Association. It'll stay that way until I advance."
“那你如何晋级呢？”
"And how do you advance?"
“靠表现好，”埃尔登回答道。“这根本不是靠资历，不像在公司和工会。像情报部长，他现在才大二。去年他把所有的时间都花在黑客身上。整晚都在黑客，整天都在睡觉，他差点被开除。现在想想，他还是挺聪明的。他以大一的成绩晋升，当时所有的课程都是及格或不及格。我不知道他是不是这样计划的。”
"By being good," Eldon answered. "It's not by seniority at all, not like in companies and trade unions. Like the minister of intelligence, he's only a sophomore now. Last year he spent all his time hacking. It was hack all night, sleep all day, and he almost flunked out. Come to think of it, he was pretty smart. He did his advancing as a freshman when all the courses are pass-fail. I wonder whether he planned it that way."
“他现在怎么样了？”
"How's he doing now?"
“他过得非常好。实际上，我不应该知道他是谁，但他为我开了一扇门，我认出了他的运动鞋。他实际上是我的朋友。我的意思是，我根本不知道。”
"He's doing really well. Actually, I'm not supposed to know who he is, but he opened a door for me and I recognized his sneakers. He's actually a friend of mine. I mean, I had no idea."
“也许你可以追随他的脚步，”我说。“顺便问一下，我有没有告诉你，中情局给我发了一封招募信？”
"Maybe you can follow in his footsteps," I said. "By the way, did I tell you the CIA sent me a recruiting letter?"
“哦，哇哦。这确实是真的。他们确实在这里招人。你知道他们是怎么找到你的地址的吗？”埃尔登问道。
"Oh, wow. It really is true. They do recruit here. Do you know how they found your address?" Eldon asked.
“我把我的简历放在就业办公室的简历簿里。这是我唯一能想到的。”
"I put my resume in the resume book at the placement office. That's the only thing I can think of."
“你还留着那封信吗？我可以看看吗？”
"Do you still have the letter? May I look at it?"
“当然。它就在我的公文包里，”我说。我把公文包放在桌子上。这是我父母送给我的圣诞礼物，用于即将到来的工作面试。
"Sure. It's here in my briefcase," I said. I put the case on the desk. My parents had given it to me for Christmas for upcoming job interviews.
“太棒了，”埃尔登说。“我不知道你有个公文包。我能玩一会儿吗？”
"Cool," Eldon said. "I didn't know you had a briefcase. Can I play with it for a second?"
“当然可以。”我说道，并把它递给了他。
"Sure," I said and handed it to him.
埃尔登变成了 Q，女王陛下特勤局总部地下室里那个穿着实验室夹克、听起来很聪明的英国人。“邦德，现在你明白了，这个公文包是专门为应对各种紧急情况而设计的。如果你想释放毒气，就一次释放一个闩锁。如果你不想让毒气流出来，就把它们一起释放。记住这一点。毒药，一次释放一个。不要一起释放毒药。你的相机是底部的这个黄铜配件；你必须用钥匙链上的特殊工具把它取下来。如果你丢了钥匙，软饮料罐的弹出式盖子就可以了。另一个黄铜配件是匕首。邦德，这次请不要弄丢了。我们花了两个月的时间为你准备它，你知道我们有多讨厌重做工作。”
Eldon became Q, the smart-sounding British guy in the lab jacket in the basement of the headquarters of Her Majesty's Secret Service. "Now you see, Bond, this briefcase is specially equipped for all types of emergencies. If you'd like to release the poison gas, release the latches one at a time. If you don't want gas to come out, release them together. Remember that. Poison, one at a time. No poison, together. Your camera is this brass fitting on the bottom; you'll have to remove it with the special tool on your keychain. If you lose your keys, the pop top from a soft drink can will do. The other brass fitting is the dagger. And, Bond, please don't lose it this time. It took us two months to prepare it for you, and you know how we hate to redo work."
我说：“你做得很好。你应该当一名演员。”
I said, "You do that well. You ought to be an actor."
埃尔登回答说：“没什么，就是电影里的情节。不管怎么说，如果我为公司工作，我就有很多机会成为演员。我们来看看这封信吧。”
Eldon answered, "It's nothing; just straight out of the movie. Anyway, if I work for the Company, I'll have plenty of opportunities to be an actor. Let's take a look at the letter."
我开始打开公文包。
I started to open the briefcase.
埃尔登说：“别忘了，没有毒，一起来。”
Eldon said, "Don't forget. No poison, together."
我同时打开了两个闩锁。
I opened both latches at the same time.
信的顶部有一只较小版本的鹰，与埃尔登在 THA 的信顶部的鹰一样。
The top of the letter had a smaller version of the eagle that was on the top of Eldon's letter from THA.
“你也有信封吗？”
"Do you have the envelope, too?"
我把信封给了他。
I gave him the envelope.
“这很有意思，”埃尔登说，“信上没有回信地址，上面写着‘不得转寄出美国’。一定是这样，当你在保加利亚度暑假摘苹果时，这封信就不会被转寄给你。否则，克格勃保加利亚分部会认为这是暗号，你是一名特工，他们会把你关进监狱。我们必须放弃他们的一个人才能把你救出来，那将是一种浪费。”
"That's interesting," Eldon said. "There's no return address on it. And it says 'Not to be forwarded out of the United States.' That must be so when you're on your summer vacation picking apples in Bulgaria the letter won't be forwarded to you. Otherwise, the Bulgarian branch of the KGB would figure it was in code, you were an operative, and they'd throw you in jail. We'd have to give up one of their guys to get you out, and that would be a waste."
埃尔登读着这封信，读的时候嘴唇动得非常快，他的眼睛以每秒五行的速度逐行扫描。
Eldon read the letter, moving his lips really fast as he read, his eyes scanning line by line about five lines per second.
“哦，太棒了，”他说，“你将会做 Q 做的所有事情。看看这个。‘高科技收集设备’，读作 bug。‘光-光机械设备’，读作微缩胶片相机。”
"Oh, cool," he said. "You'll be doing all the things that Q does. Look at this. 'High-technology collection devices,' read bugs. 'Photo-optical-mechanical devices,' read microfilm cameras."
“不过，我不知道我是否会坚持下去。必须更好地利用技术来保护我们的自由和生活水平。”
"I don't know whether I'll follow through on it, though. There must be better uses of technology to protect our liberties and standard of living."
“像什么？”
"Like what?"
“我不知道，算上灯泡什么的。”
"I don't know, counting light bulbs or something."
“嘿，我最近听到了几个关于灯泡的笑话，”埃尔登说。“换一个灯泡需要多少塔夫茨大学的学生？”
"Hey, I heard a couple of good light bulb jokes recently," Eldon said. "How many Tufts students does it take to change a light bulb?"
“我不知道。有多少？”
"I don't know. How many?"
“只要一个，但是他们能因此得到十二个学分。换一个灯泡需要多少个研究生？”
"Only one, but they get twelve credits for it. How many graduate students does it take to change a light bulb?"
“我不知道。有多少？”
"I don't know. How many?"
“只有一年，但需要十年。我现在得走了。明天就要交 Big Eight 02 问题集了。嘿，顺便说一句。不要告诉任何人我的名字。在所有 THA 邮件中，他们只使用名字和姓氏首字母；匿名是关键。而且我告诉你的一切都是机密。如果你在我毕业前发表它，那真的会搞砸我的未来，”Eldon 说。
"Only one, but it takes ten years. I gotta go now. Big eight oh two problem set due tomorrow. Hey, by the way. Don't tell anyone my name. In all THA mailings they use only first names and last initials; anonymity is key. And everything I've told you is classified. If you publish it before I graduate it could really mess up my future," Eldon said.
“我有一种令人陶醉的权力感，有点像鲍勃·伍德沃德，”我说道。
"I have a heady feeling of power, sort of like Bob Woodward," I said.
“是啊，你为什么不叫我‘深喉’？不，那太俗气了。哦，我知道。叫我‘铬穹’怎么样？或者‘甘地’？是的，甘地，就是这样。那太好了。简称我甘地就行了。不管怎样，就像我说的，我得走了。记住。别跟任何人说我到底是谁。
"Yeah, why don't you call me Deep Throat? Nah, that's too tacky. Oh, I know. How about Chromedome? Or Gandhi? Yeah, Gandhi, that's it. That'll be great. Just call me Gand for short. Anyway, like I say, I gotta go. Remember. Not a word to anyone about who I really am.
“好的，甘德。”
"Okay, Gand."
章节
C H A P T E R
16
16
爸爸闪电
Papa Flash
1983 年 5 月 5 日
May 5, 1983
每年的赛马日都会举行烤公牛活动。烤公牛活动是高年级学生宿舍为返校周末举办的活动，届时校友们会回来追忆昔日的辉煌，本科生们则会在考试前最后一次比赛。
Steer Roast is on Derby Day every year. Steer Roast is Senior House's answer to homecoming weekend, when alums come back to remember the glory days and undergrads play one last time before exams.
那是一个温暖宜人的星期六下午，庭院里挤满了人，至少有几百人，他们坐在野餐桌旁，吃着牛肉或素食千层面和玉米棒。一群由前教师组成的蓝草乐队在一角的舞台上演奏，《运动死亡》的横幅在 Runkle 4 的微风中轻轻飘扬。频闪灯的发明者 Edgerton 教授演奏着勺子。
It was a beautiful warm Saturday afternoon, and the courtyard was jammed with people, a couple of hundred at least, sitting at picnic tables, eating their beef or vegetarian lasagna and corn on the cob. A bluegrass group of former tutors played from the stage at one corner, and the Sport Death banner waved gently in the breeze from Runkle 4. Professor Edgerton, the strobe inventor, played the spoons.
Senior House 校友俱乐部在现实世界中是自由人。从零零碎碎的谈话中，我了解到许多人在初创公司工作，薪水很高，还有股票期权。其他人则在家里用个人电脑做软件咨询，比如黛安·米切尔，但薪水更高。其他人在 Sun、Lotus、Apple 或硅谷的初创公司拥有较低的员工徽章编号和股票期权。
The Senior House alumni club were free agents in the real world. From the dribs and drabs of the conversations, I gathered that many worked at start-up companies for good pay and stock options. Others did software consulting at home on their personal computers, like Dianne Mitchell, only for higher stakes. Others had low employee badge numbers and stock options at Sun, Lotus, Apple, or start-ups in Silicon Valley.
他们喜欢 Senior House，在做了自己喜欢做的事（黑客）赚了 10 万美元后，他们对麻省理工学院的回忆似乎也变得更美好了。我希望有一天我对麻省理工学院的回忆也会变得美好。
They loved Senior House, and after making $100K doing what they loved to do-hack-it seemed that their memories of MIT had become a little fonder, too. I hoped my memories of MIT would be fond some day.
玛丽回到了高级宿舍参加聚会，我们并排坐在一张野餐桌旁。她穿着她的“运动死亡” T 恤。
Mary had come back to Senior House for the reunion and we sat next to each other at one of the picnic tables. She wore her Sport Death T-shirt.
“这会勾起我往日的回忆吗？”我问她。
"Does this bring back memories?" I asked her.
“一些。”
"Some."
“好的，坏的？”
"Good ones, bad ones?"
“两者都有。”
"Some of both."
朗克尔的一名二年级学生身穿棒球接球手的服装，撑着伞。他站在格雷校长花园墙边的桌子上，挥着双手，让会众安静下来。
A sophomore from Runkle wore a baseball catcher's outfit and carried an umbrella. He stood on the table next to President Gray's garden wall and waved his hands downward to quiet the assembly.
“现在正是你们期盼的时刻。你们知道，”他说，“去年我被评为高年级宿舍‘最讨厌的新生’。根据我所赋予的权力，我在此宣布霍华德·盖尔曼为 83 届荣誉学士。”
"And now for the moment you've been waiting for. As you know," he said, "last year I was selected the 'Most Obnoxious Freshman' of Senior House. By the powers of that office bestowed upon me, I hereby pronounce Howard Gelman M.O.F. of '83."
他是走廊尽头的那个书呆子，秋天第一个来参加我的学习休息，他预测了其他人的泊松到达分布。每个人都从他的桌子上散开，他躲在桌子下面。玉米棒开始朝他的方向飞来。不是曲线玉米棒，只是豆形玉米棒。暴徒们聚集在他的桌子上，近距离向他没有保护的一侧扔玉米棒，就像普通狂热分子扔石头一样狂热。他快速爬出野餐桌的另一端，冲向格雷家的花园墙，一路被扔。
It was that geeky kid from down the hall, the first one to come to my study break in the fall, the one who predicted the Poisson arrival distribution of the others. Everyone scattered from his table and he ducked under it. The corncobs started flying in his direction. Not curve cobs, just bean cob fast cobs. The mob converged on his table and pelted his unprotected side from point-blank range with all the fervor of generic zealots at a stoning. He speed-crawled out the other end of the picnic table and dashed toward the Grays' garden wall, pelted all the way.
我想让这一切停止。玛丽没有说任何话，也没有扔任何东西。我也没有。数百万德国人也没有。
I wanted to make it stop. Mary didn't say or throw anything. Neither did I. Neither did millions of Germans.
当暴徒们把剩下的投掷物扔出去时，这孩子举起一把折叠椅遮住脸。戴着捕手面具的二年级学生说：“你想在获奖感言中说些什么？”
The kid held up a folding chair to shield his face while the mob hurled the remaining projectiles. The sophomore in the catcher's mask said, "What would you like to say for your acceptance speech?"
我惊讶于他居然还能做出回应。
I was amazed that he could respond at all.
“好吧。”Zing，pelt。“我……”Pelt“……在没有先咨询我的律师的情况下不能接受这笔奖金。”
"Well." Zing, pelt. "I ..." Pelt "... can't accept the award without first consulting my lawyer."
周日晚上，我与约翰·多尔西 (John Dorsey) 谈论了玉米穗的收获。
Sunday night I talked to John Dorsey about the cobbing.
“我对昨天发生在霍华德·吉尔曼身上的事感到非常难过，”我说道。
"I feel terrible about what happened to Howard Gelman yesterday," I said.
“这是这里的传统，”约翰说。“通常孩子们知道这事要发生，会用伞或其他东西作为盾牌。今年有点失控了。一位精神病医生朋友建议他们向自己的形象扔玉米棒；因为这些孩子中有很多在高中时被排斥，所以他们借此机会挑出一个并用石头砸死他或她。这源于异教徒的活人献祭传统。”
"It's a tradition around here," John said. "Usually the kid knows it's coming and has an umbrella or something as a shield. This year it went a little out of control. A psychiatrist friend sug gested that they're throwing corncobs at their own self-images; since many of these kids were outcasts in high school, they take this chance to single out one and stone him or her. It follows from the pagan tradition of human sacrifice."
“我不知道。我还是觉得这太恶心了。我仿佛看到那个可怜的家伙给家里写信。‘亲爱的爸爸妈妈，昨天宿舍里的每个人都向我扔玉米棒。我真的很受欢迎。’”
"I don't know. I still think it's sick. I can just see that poor guy writing a letter home. 'Dear Mom and Dad, Everyone in the dorm threw corncobs at me yesterday. I'm really popular.' "
1983 年 5 月 22 日
May 22, 1983
“呃，你好，我可以和埃杰顿医生通话吗？”我在电话里询问他的秘书。
"Uh, hello, may I speak with Doctor Edgerton, please?" I asked his secretary on the phone.
“等一下。”
"Just a minute."
“呃，你好，埃杰顿博士。我叫佩珀·怀特，是斯隆实验室的学生，我想问一下我是否可以约你谈谈一些照片。你明天有时间吗？”
"Uh, hello, Doctor Edgerton. My name is Pepper White and I'm a student at the Sloan Lab, and I was wondering whether I could make an appointment to talk to you about some pictures. Do you have any time tomorrow?"
“现在有什么事吗？”他轻快地回答。“你忙吗？”
"What's the matter with now?" he answered briskly. "You busy?"
“呃，我要和一个......开会。”
"Uh, I have a meeting with a ..."
“你很忙。明天九点半怎么样？”
"You are busy. How about tomorrow at 9:30?"
“好的，先生。谢谢您。”
"Okay, sir. Thank you."
5 月 23 日
May 23
我来到 4 号楼的四楼，大厅里摆满了陈列柜，一年前我第一次去图书馆做文献调查时就欣赏过这些陈列柜。当时我并不知道我的工作可能会与研究所的传奇人物埃杰顿博士 (Doc Edgerton) 接触。埃杰顿博士可以与埃菲尔铁塔、爱迪生或贝尔相媲美。我不知道自己能否与他相媲美。
I went to the fourth floor in Building 4, the hall lined with display cases that I'd admired on my first trip to the library to do my literature survey the year before. I had no idea then that my work might involve rubbing elbows with Doc Edgerton, the institute's legend in his own time. Doc Edgerton could have held his own with Eiffel (as in Tower), or with Edison, or with Bell. I wondered whether I could hold my own with him.
Doc 于 1903 年出生于内布拉斯加州，那一年正是莱特兄弟首次飞行的年份。他就读于内布拉斯加大学，后来作为研究生进入麻省理工学院电气工程系。尽管他只有麻省理工学院的学位（硕士、博士），但他在 1932 年就成为了一名助理教授。
Doc was born in Nebraska in 1903, the year of the Wright Brothers' first flight. He went to the University of Nebraska and came to MIT as a graduate student in the Electrical Engineering department. Even though he was only MIT squared (M.S., Ph.D.), he'd become an assistant professor in 1932.
作为博士研究的副产品，他首先开发了闪光摄影技术，并以此为基础与他的两名研究生 Germeshausen 和 Grier 共同创立了 EG&G., Inc. 公司。该公司发展迅速，Doc 和他的合伙人也因此成为马萨诸塞州最富有的三人之一。
As a by-product of his Ph.D. research, he first developed the strobe photography techniques that were the basis for the company he founded with two of his graduate students, Germeshausen and Grier. E.G.&G., Inc., grew rapidly, making Doc and his partners three of the richest men in Massachusetts.
但 Doc 首先是一名工程师，更不用说还是一名中西部人，因此他对走进他办公室的任何人都保持友好和开放的态度。
But Doc was first and foremost an engineer, not to mention a midwesterner, so he remained friendly and open to whoever wandered into his office.
四楼的走廊被称为频闪巷，走廊两旁挂满了清晰的大幅照片，这些照片都是艾杰顿发明的频闪灯带来的：飞行中蝙蝠的定格、马戏团杂技演员翻筋斗的轨迹、被踢出的足球、米奇·鲁尼搂着朱迪·加兰微笑着唱歌。
The fourth floor hallway, called Strobe Alley, was lined with large, clear photographs, all made possible by Edgerton's strobe invention: a bat frozen in flight, a somersaulting circus acrobat's trajectory, a football being kicked, Mickey Rooney with his arm around Judy Garland, smiling and singing.
大厅另一边的展柜里陈列着 20 世纪 40 年代风格的黑色金属电子盒，上面贴着“EG&G”金属标签。其他展柜里陈列着古代沉船的遗物，比如金属花瓶，这些都是博物馆里的东西。
On the other side of the hall cases displayed 1940s-style black metal electronics boxes with "EG&G" metal tags attached. Other cases displayed relics of ancient shipwrecks-ums, metal vases, things you'd see in a museum.
我穿过画着“Enter”的门，走到工作台前，Doc 正在和一位 70 多岁的年轻人交谈。他们俩都站着，手里拿着装在塑料袋里的东西，看起来像是湿纸巾卷。一个四英尺长的黄色鱼雷状物体躺在地板上，旁边是另一个标有 EG&G 的盒子。Doc 开始将其中一卷纸巾放入 EG&G 盒子；这个盒子是一个图表记录器，用于记录鱼雷（也称为侧扫声纳）发送的数据。
I went through the door with "Enter" painted on it and walked to a workbench where Doc was talking to a younger man in his mid-seventies. They were both standing up and held things that looked like rolls of wet paper towels in plastic bags. A fourfoot-long yellow torpedolike thing lay on the floor, next to another box with EG&G marked on it. Doc started to put one of the paper towel rolls into the EG&G box; the box was a chart recorder to record data sent from the torpedo, also known as side-scan sonar.
“儿子，我能为你做些什么？”医生问道。
"What can I do for you, son?" Doc asked.
“我昨天下午打电话预约了。”
"I called yesterday afternoon to make an appointment."
“哦，是的。我记得，”医生说。“你有什么问题吗？”
"Oh yeah. I remember," Doc said. "What's your problem?"
“我正在研究一台快速压缩机。它在斯隆汽车实验室里。”
"I'm working on a rapid compression machine. It's in the Sloan Auto Lab."
“是的，我知道斯隆实验室，”他说。“三十年代，一个叫德雷珀的年轻人在那里研究过柴油发动机。你打算做什么他没做过的事呢？”
"Yeah, I know the Sloan Lab," he said. "A young guy by the name of Draper did some work on a diesel engine there in the thirties. What are you going to do that he didn't do?"
“好吧，我们更清楚自己在做什么，”我说。
"Well, we know more about what we're doing," I said.
“我打电话给斯塔克·德雷珀并告诉他你这么说吗？”
"Suppose I call Stark Draper and tell him you said that?"
我其实并不想与惯性制导系统的发明者一对一交谈，惯性制导系统可以让导弹着陆目标，并将人类送上月球。“我认为没有必要。我只是说，我们可以在快速压缩机中比德雷珀教授在真正的发动机中更精确地控制我们的操作参数。我正在尝试制作一些柴油喷雾的电影，我想你也许可以告诉我一些可用的技术。我们正在使用高速摄像机、HYCAM 和......”
I didn't really want to go one-on-one with the inventor of the inertial guidance system that makes missiles land on target and put men on the moon. "I don't think that will be necessary. I just mean that we can control our operating parameters more precisely in the rapid compression machine than Professor Draper could in a real engine. I'm trying to make some movies of a diesel fuel spray, and I thought you might be able to tell me about some of the techniques available. We're using a high-speed movie camera, a HYCAM, and..."
“那你就准备好了。你有什么事要跟我谈吗？”
"You're all set then. What do you need to talk to me about."
“我想你可以告诉我是否有比我们现在的速度更快的东西，或者你是否有任何速度更快的相机。”
"I thought you could tell me whether there's anything faster than what we have or whether you have any cameras that go faster."
“你得跟我的同事查理·米勒谈谈这件事。他是电影专家，”Doc 说。“这项技术最快的速度大约是每秒 10,000 帧。你想要多少帧？”
"You'll have to talk to my colleague Charlie Miller about that. He's the expert on movies," Doc said. "The fastest that technology goes is about 10,000 frames per second. How many frames you want?"
“五万就不错了。”
"Fifty thousand would be nice."
“是的。你和其他人一样，总是想拍摄越来越多的照片，但看到的却越来越少。现在，如果你用几分之一微秒的闪光灯进行一次曝光，那可能会很有教育意义。然后你就可以看到一些单独的燃料液滴，获得一些不错的分辨率。我们喜欢拍一张 4 乘 5 英寸的照片，然后把它放大到几平方英尺，然后你就会开始看到真正发生了什么。你想试试吗？”
"Yep. You're just like everyone else, always trying to take pictures of more and more and you see less and less. Now if you take a single exposure with a fraction-of-a-microsecond flash, that might be educational. Then you could see some individual fuel droplets, get some good resolution. We like to take a 4-by-5-inch print and then blow it up to a couple of feet square and then you begin to see what's really going on. Would you like to try that?"
“当然可以，”我说，“我想拍一张有史以来最好的柴油喷雾照片。”
"Sure," I said. "I'd like to have the best pictures of a diesel fuel spray that've ever been taken."
“很好。这是比利·麦克罗伯茨，”医生指着那位七十多岁的年轻人说道。“他是我的技术员。我们三个人一起看看能找到什么。”
"Good. This here's Billy MacRoberts," Doc said, motioning to the younger man in his mid-seventies. "He's my technician. Let's the three of us see what we can find."
我们三人来到他们记录借出设备的笔记本前，原来他们借给我的设备是 1981 年借给 Ben 的研究前任的，承诺的归还日期是 1981 年 5 月 25 日。
The three of us went to the notebook where they recorded what equipment they'd lent out. It turned out that the equipment they'd lent me had been lent to Ben's research predecessor in 1981. The promised return date was May 25, 1981.
“还有两天就要交了，”Doc 说。“哦。那是 1981 年，不是 1983 年。这个叫 Vilchis 的人到底在哪里？”他问道，指的是表格上的名字。
"It's due in two days," Doc said. "Oh. That's 1981, not 1983. Where is this Vilchis guy anyway?" he asked, referring to the name on the form.
“他一年前毕业了，”我说。
"He graduated a year ago," I said.
“我们下去看看能不能找到那些东西，”Doc 说。
"Let's go down there and see whether we can find that stuff," Doc said.
他把我带到我的牢房。我向他展示了我们安装的电子箱，并解释了我们如何拍摄了第一部燃油喷射的高速影片。本不在，尼克找不到那些东西，所以我问医生是否想看我上周拍摄的影片。
He escorted me to my cell. I showed him the electronics boxes we'd installed, and I explained how we'd shot the first high-speed movies of the fuel spray. Ben wasn't around and Nick couldn't find the stuff, so I asked Doc whether he wanted to see the movie I'd made the week before.
“当然可以。我们去看看吧，”他说。
"Sure. Let's take a look," he said.
我设置了投影仪，尽量不笨手笨脚，不把胶片穿线弄乱。这比我以前花的时间更长，但第一次就成功了。
I set up the projector and tried not to be a klutz and mess up the threading of the film. It took longer than when I did it before but it worked the first time.
“我们需要拍摄大部分影片才能看到正在发生的事情。HYCAM 必须达到全速，”我说。
"It takes most of the film to reach where we see what's happening. The HYCAM has to reach full speed," I said.
“是的。这就是高速摄影行业的问题所在。大多数胶片都被扔进了垃圾桶，”他回答道。
"Yep. That's the problem with this high-speed photography business. Most of the film goes in the trash," he answered.
影片播放一分钟后，燃料喷射器出现了。它光线充足，焦点清晰。“你可以想象我第一次运行这个东西并等待看是否能发现喷射物时的焦虑，”我说。
A minute into the film, the fuel jet appeared. It was well-lit, in focus, and clear. "You can imagine my anxiety the first time I ran this thing and waited to see whether I caught the injection," I said.
“这是一张好照片。第一次看到它的时候一定很激动。”他坚定地说。
"That's a good picture. It must have been a thrill the first time you saw it." He said it with conviction.
本敲了敲放映室的门，我们三个人下楼来到本的牢房，找到了比尔制作的一些金属和玻璃碎片。它们被放在本的储物柜的杂物区里。
Ben knocked on the door to the screening room and the three of us went downstairs to Ben's cell and found some little pieces of metal and glass that Bill had made. They were in the random junk section of Ben's storage cabinet.
“是的。就是这个，”医生说。“我们把它带回实验室，让比利修好它。”
"Yeah. This is the stuff," Doc said. "Let's take it back to the lab and get Billy to fix it."
其中一块玻璃看上去像一根试管，开口处装有融化的塑料。医生讲了一个故事。
One of the pieces of glass looked like a test tube, with melted plastic at the open end. Doc told a story.
“几年前，比尔和我安装了其中一种闪光灯，我们发现缠绕在闪光灯周围的塑料线吸收了大部分热量，几乎防止了闪光灯破裂。我们用两倍厚的塑料包裹闪光灯，闪光灯却没有破裂。这就是工程学。”
"A couple of years ago Bill and I had one of these flashes set up, and we found that plastic wire wrapped around it absorbed most of the heat and almost prevented it from breaking. We put twice as much plastic around it, and it didn't break. That's engineering."
我们穿过 13 号楼，路过一张 Vannevar Bush（16 岁）在钻床旁的照片，他身穿天鹅绒衬衫。“你来自哪里？”Doc 问道。
We walked back through Building 13, past the photo of Vannevar Bush ('16) at a drill press, wearing a velour shirt. "Where you from?" Doc asked.
“北卡罗来纳州，”我回答道。“但我父亲来自北岸的贝弗利。”
"North Carolina," I answered. "But my father's from Beverly up on the North Shore."
“所以你是个叛徒，”他说。“比利和我都是北方佬，我们在这里呆了很久。但我不会因为你是叛徒而责怪你。我在北卡罗来纳州有很多亲戚。我的一个孙子是希科利的注册会计师，另一个是教堂山的医生，还有一个是罗利的律师。”
"So you're a rebel," he said. "Billy and I are both Yankees, we've been here so long. But I won't hold your being a rebel against you. I've got a lot of family in North Carolina. One of my grandchildren is a CPA in Hickory, another's a doctor in Chapel Hill, another's a lawyer in Raleigh."
“可惜他们都没做出什么成绩，”我轻声说道，却收到一个冷漠的眼神。“开玩笑的。”
"Too bad none of them are making anything of themselves," I said lightly but received a cold look in return. "Just kidding."
现在我们回到了 Strobe Alley，墙上有一幅画，画上的东西看起来像是一个在金属框架上慢慢融化的高尔夫球。
By now we were back at Strobe Alley, and on the wall there was a picture of something that looked like a slowly melting golfball on top of a metal frame.
“情况是不是正如我所想的那样？”我问医生。
"Is that what I think it is?" I asked Doc.
“是的，”他回答道。“那是 20 世纪 40 年代中期他们试图制造的小型原子弹。我们必须使用旋转快门和磁偏振器。你知道，这些东西会发出很多光。”
"Yep," he answered. "That's a small atom bomb they were trying to get to work back in the mid-forties. We had to take that one with a rotating shutter and a magnetic polarizer. Those things let out a lot of light, you know."
只是事实。我回答说：“当我做论文文献调查时，我偶然发现了一篇有趣的论文，题为‘浮力柱的快速上升’。这是一份 AEC 报告，写于 1945 年。我敢打赌他们谈论的是同一件事。”
Just a matter of fact. I answered, "When I did my thesis literature survey I came across an interesting paper entitled 'The Rapid Rise of a Buoyant Plume.' It was an AEC report and was written in 1945. I bet they were talking about the same thing."
“听起来是这样的，傻瓜？”Doc 说。
"Sounds like it, dudinit?" Doc said.
我们再次进入 Doc 的实验室。Bill 仍在往侧扫声纳纸巾卷里加水。
We entered Doc's lab again. Bill was still loading water into the side-scan sonar paper towel rolls.
“那个人说他把它带回来了，”多克说。“某个叫麦克罗伯茨的人肯定忘了把它记下来。”
"The guy says he brought it back," Doc said. "Some guy named MacRoberts must have forgotten to write it down when he did."
“或者是某个叫埃杰顿的家伙，”比尔反驳道。
"Or some guy named Edgerton," Bill retorted.
“好吧，让我们把这家伙治好，”医生指着我说。“然后把他带走，这样我们就可以做一些工作了。来吧，我们去另一个房间看看我们能借给他什么。”
"Well, let's get this guy fixed up," Doc said, referring to me. "And get him out of here so we can get some work done. Come on, let's go into the other room and see what we can lend him."
我们穿过大厅，走进实验室的另一半。它看起来就像我在高中时在达罗莎老师的物理课上看到的麻省理工学院的照片。每个工作台上都有闪光灯，著名的旋转轮上有不同的圆圈，当闪光灯闪烁得越来越快或越来越慢时，它就静止不动。越来越多的电子盒子来自前五十年。
We crossed the hall and went into the other half of the lab. It looked like the pictures from MIT I'd seen in Mrs. DaRosa's physics class in high school. There were strobe lights on every workbench, the famous spinning wheel with different circles on it that stand still as the strobe light flashes faster and slower. More and more electronic boxes from the preceding five decades.
斯隆实验室给人一种古旧的感觉；这个房间也是如此，但它却是高科技的。也许斯隆实验室也是如此。在走廊旁边的墙上，有一把 .22 口径的步枪水平地挂在一张工作台上。它后面有一块纸板，上面喷了黑色漆，就像我在牢房里喷的一些东西一样。
The Sloan Lab felt archaic; so did this room, but it was hightech. Maybe the Sloan Lab was, too. Along the wall next to the corridor there was a .22 caliber rifle mounted horizontally on one of the workbenches. There was a piece of cardboard behind it, spray-painted black like some of the things I'd spray-painted in my cell.
“就是这个吗？”我问道，知道 Doc 会知道我指的是他的子弹系列照片：一颗子弹穿过方块 J 后静止不动；一颗子弹刚离开苹果后静止不动；一颗子弹穿过蜡烛时产生的冲击波。
"Is this it?" I asked, knowing Doc would know I referred to his bullet series of photographs: a bullet standing still after it shears the jack of diamonds; a bullet just after it leaves an apple; a bullet and its shock wave as it passes through a candle.
“是的，”他说，“我们通常使用 .45 口径手枪，但它发出的噪音太大了。前几天我们为一些高中生做了一个演示，我们不想把他们的耳朵震破。如果你看那边，你会发现我们必须用什么东西接住子弹。”他指着一个看起来像 Clorox 瓶子的东西。
"Yep," he said. "Usually we use a .45 caliber pistol, but it makes too much noise. The other day we did a demonstration for some high schoolers and we didn't want to blast their ears out. If you look over there you'll see we have to catch the bullet with something." He pointed to something that looked like a Clorox bottle.
“里面是什么？”我问道，心想那可能是防弹衣之类的东西。
"What's inside that?" I asked, thinking it'd be something like flak jacket material.
“哦，那只是我们在里维尔海滩捡到的一些沙子。它会消耗很多能量，”Doc 回答道。
"Oh, that's just some sand we picked up at Revere Beach. It kills a lot of energy," Doc replied.
比尔从工作台后面拿出两个黑色金属盒子。它们是纯模拟的，早于晶体管和数字计算机——它们让我想起了沿着无尽走廊的麻省理工学院战时国防研究的照片。两个盒子上都有和实验室里其他东西一样的小 EG&G 标签。我试图想象在一个每个物体上都有我姓名首字母的地方工作。比尔拿起另一个玻璃东西，看起来像是本的储物柜里塑料线不够的破损试管。
Bill pulled two of the black metal boxes off the back of the bench. They were strictly analog, predating the transistor and digital computers-they reminded me of pictures of MIT wartime defense research along the infinite corridor. Both of the boxes had the same little EG&G tags that everything else in the lab had. I tried to imagine working in a place where every object had my initials on it. Bill picked up another glass thing that looked like the broken test tube with not enough plastic wire that was in Ben's storage cabinet.
“我们要看看这个方法是否有效吗，医生？”比尔问道。
"Shall we see whether this one works, Doc?" Bill asked.
“当然可以。插上电源，”Doc 回答道。他一边给我解释闪光灯的工作原理，一边让 Bill 接上电线。“Billy 至少见过一次所有东西都坏掉，所以他知道发生故障时该怎么做。他应该能很快帮你修好这个东西。你看，你有两个电容器；一个 8,500 伏正极，一个 8,500 伏负极，总共 17,000 伏。如果你用错方法，它会给你一个很大的打击。我还需要多说吗？”
"Sure. Plug it in," Doc answered. He explained the operation of the flash to me while Bill connected the wires. "Billy's seen everything fail at least once, so he knows what to do about it when it happens. He should be able to fix up this thing for you in a jiffy. See, you got two capacitors; one 8,500 volts positive, one 8,500 volts negative, for 17,000 volts. That'll give you a nice kick if you touch it the wrong way. Need I say more?"
Bill 接好所有电线后按下了“手动”按钮。突然，一道白光闪现，非常明亮，我觉得 Bill 和 Doc 应该已经因为看了那道光太多次而失明了。
Bill finished connecting all the wires and he pressed the "manual" button. And POP there was a white flash so bright that I thought Bill and Doc should be blind by now from looking at that flash so many times.
“那只是一微秒的一小部分，”Doc 说。“给，看看这个，”他指着试管里的另一个小玻璃管说。“那东西就是我们所说的刺针。高压电使电极之间的气体电离，然后电阻下降，火花就跳了过来。它就像一个火花塞，只是功率更大。”
"That's a fraction of a microsecond," Doc said. "Here. Take a look at this," he said pointing to the other little glass tube inside the test tube. "That thing there's what we call the stinger. The high voltage ionizes the gas in between the electrodes here, and then the electrical resistance goes down and the spark jumps across. It's just like a spark plug, only more powerful."
管子发出咔哒声，我问医生那是什么。
The tubes made a clicking noise and I asked Doc what it was.
“电晕放电，”他说。“在间隙上施加足够的电压，这些电子就会死亡并跳到低压侧。”
"Corona discharge," he said. "Put enough voltage across a gap and those electrons will just die to hop over to the low-voltage side."
也许狄塞尔先生“显然掉进”了英吉利海峡，从此不见了踪影，他想跳到低压区。也许希尔班上的那个孩子也死于电压的强度。我想把这些写在纸上，但我把笔记本留在牢房里了。“你有纸可以让我记笔记吗？”我问道。
Maybe Herr Diesel wanted to hop over to the low-voltage side when he "apparently fell" into the English Channel and was never seen again. Maybe the kid in Hill's class succumbed to the intensity of the voltage as well. I wanted to put some of this on paper, but I'd left my notebook in my cell. "Do you have a sheet of paper I could take some notes on?" I asked.
“当然可以。给你。”医生给了我一张已经废了的宝丽来照片，照片的一角已经撕掉了。
"Sure. Here." Doc gave me a wasted Polaroid print with one corner torn off it.
“我们得到一切了吗，比利？”医生问道。
"We got everything, Billy?" Doc asked.
“当然可以，医生，”比尔·麦克罗伯茨回答道。
"Sure do, Doc," Bill MacRoberts answered.
“好吧，既然我们在这里，就把这个长凳清理一下吧。我们得把这些 2×4 木板扔掉。这家伙看得出来我们俩都是在农场长大的。” Doc 向我眨了眨眼，提到了他早年在内布拉斯加州的生活。
"Well, while we're here let's clean up this bench a little bit. We gotta get rid of these two-by-fours. This guy can tell we both grew up on the farm." Doc winked at me, referring to his early days in Nebraska.
他们收拾了一些东西，我们又穿过了闪光灯巷。“我们现在得给你装上一个遮光罩，这样闪光灯就不会直接射到相机上，你就只能看到这个了。比利，你能给这家伙做一个吗？”
They put a few things away and we crossed Strobe Alley again. "We gotta fix you up with a shield now so the flash doesn't go straight to the camera and that's all you see. Billy, can you make one up for this fella?"
“当然可以，医生。” 比利切了一块铝，用金属板折弯机把它卷成合适的形状，它完美地适合试管。
"Sure thing, Doc." Billy cut a piece of aluminum, rolled it to shape in a sheet metal bender, and it fit perfectly on the test tube.
“他还需要什么吗，比利？”医生问道。
"He need anything else, Billy?" Doc asked.
比尔说：“这只是一个防止电涌回流到触发器的电路。”我很奇怪他们为什么称它为触发器，它和我牢房里的示波器上的东西是一样的。
"Just a circuit to prevent the power surge from going back to the trigger," Bill said. I wondered why they called it a trigger, the same thing that was on the oscilloscope in my cell.
“你们两个为什么不回另一个房间看看能不能找到一个呢？我现在得看看我的邮件了。”
"Why don't the two of you go back to the other room and see whether you can find one. I gotta go through my mail now."
比尔和我又去了另一个储藏室。比尔快速计算了一下闪光灯的瞬时功率输出：6 兆瓦，相当于 10 万个灯泡的功率，但持续时间非常非常短。库仑、电荷、伏特和电势对比尔来说就像英寸和磅对我一样真实。我们找不到电路，所以比尔让我回去和医生谈谈，他继续寻找电路。
Bill and I went to the other storage room again. Bill did a quick calculation of the strobe's instantaneous power output: 6 megawatts, or about the equivalent power of 100,000 light bulbs, but for a very, very short time. Coulombs, electric charges, volts, and electric potential were as real to Bill as inches and pounds were to me. We couldn't find the circuit so Bill sent me back to talk to Doc while he continued to look for the circuit.
Doc 仍在翻看他的邮件。“我从 Koosta 那儿收到一封信，”他说。“你知道，Koosta 第一次来这里是 1952 年。他还很年轻，没人听说过他。那时《国家地理》特辑还没有播出。哎呀，电视机出现之前几乎还没出现。不管怎么说，我当时告诉班上的每一个学生，如果他们不带十个朋友来听 Koosta 的演讲，他们就会……”Doc 用食指划了划脖子。“这招很管用。演讲会上座无虚席，预订了 26-100 座位的人甚至进不了门，因为人太多了。”我感到很困惑，于是偷偷看了一眼信。信上署名的是雅克·库斯托。
Doc was still going through his mail. "Got something here from Koosta," he said. "You know, Koosta first came here in 1952. He was young and nobody'd ever heard of him. It was before the "National Geographic" specials. Heck, it was practically before TV. Anyway, I told every student in the class I was teaching then that if they didn't bring ten of their friends to the talk Koosta was giving it was going to be ..." and Doc drew his index finger across his neck. "It worked. It was standing room only for the lecture, and the guy who booked 26-100 for it couldn't even get in the door it was so crowded." I was confused so I peeked at the letter. It was signed by Jacques Cousteau.
“当然，库斯塔现在已经是个老人了，”Doc 说道。
"Of course, Koosta's an old man now," Doc said.
“但他已经失去热情了吗？”我问道。
"But has he lost his enthusiasm?" I asked.
“没有。'
"Nope.'
“这才是最重要的，不是吗？”我补充道。
"That's the important thing, isn't it?" I added.
“当然了。你会法语吗？”Doc 问道。
"Sure is. You read French?" Doc asked.
“是的，”我回答道，并开始阅读信中的内容。
"Yes, I do," I answered and started reading the text of the letter.
“看起来他们想让我填写一份问卷，用于他们正在编写的一本关于他们船只航行的书，”Doc 说。“这是什么问题？”
"It looks like they want me to fill out this questionnaire for some book they're doing about their ship's voyages," Doc said. "What's this question?"
“呃，我想他们想知道你乘船航行了多少次。如果只有一次或更少，他们就不想让你填写表格。”我翻译道。
"Um, I think they want to know how many times you went on the ship's voyages. If it's one or less they don't want you to fill out the form," I translated.
“你觉得八人有资格吗？”Doc 打趣道。“这个问题怎么样？”
"Think eight'll qualify?" Doc quipped. "How about this question here?"
“他们需要你在船上拍摄的所有照片的复印件。”
"They want copies of any photographs you may have taken while on board."
“我们有两千个。从中挑选出最好的，他们难道不会觉得很有趣吗？”Doc 说。
"We've got two thousand. Wouldn't they have a fun time picking through those to find the best ones?" Doc said.
当我们谈论大海的话题时，我问他什么时候能打捞泰坦尼克号。
While we were on the subject of the sea I asked him when he would raise the Titanic.
“我们知道它在哪里，”他一边说，一边从钱包里掏出一张皱巴巴的纸片。“它位于北纬 41 度 16 分，西经 50 度 14 分。这是我在看的一本书上找到的。那是一个 50 英里乘 50 英里的区域。那只是地球上的一个点，但要在这么大的水域里找到一艘船，可不容易。”
"We know where it is," he said as he pulled out a crumpled piece of paper from his wallet. "It's at 41 degrees 16 minutes north, 50 degrees 14 minutes west. I got that out of a book I was reading. That's an area 50 miles by 50 miles. That's just a point on the globe, but try finding a ship in that much water. It's not easy."
Doc 继续说道：“几年前，我们在地中海海底发现了她的姊妹船，但当时只在 300 英尺深的水下。泰坦尼克号在 12,000 英尺深的水下，而我的声纳只能在 3,000 英尺深的水下工作。”他转过身，在办公桌旁边的黑板上画画。
Doc continued. "We found her sister ship on the bottom of the Mediterranean some years ago, but that was in only 300 feet of water. The Titanic's in 12,000 feet of water and my sonar only works to depths of 3,000. He turned around and drew on the blackboard beside his desk.
“所以你有很多电缆，它们总是悬挂在船后，形成直角三角形的斜边。这可不是件容易的事，在公海中拖着 15,000 英尺长的电缆，然后卷起来再解开。如果你找到了它，那你该怎么办？试图从海底打捞它又是另一回事。”
"So you've got a lot of cable, and it's always going to be hanging behind the ship, making the hypotenuse of a right triangle. That's no easy trick, to have 15,000 feet of cable dragging behind you in the open ocean, then to coil it and uncoil it. And if you find it, then whadaya do? It's a whole 'nother can of worms to try and raise it from the bottom."
这个艰巨而神秘的任务被简化为几何图形，而且按照 Doc 的说法似乎是可以完成的。
This Herculean, mythic task was reduced to geometry and seemed doable the way Doc talked about it.
比尔找到了电路并把它带给了医生。“我只找到了一个，医生，”他说。
Bill had found the circuit and brought it in to Doc. "I only could find one, Doc," he said.
“好吧，把它拿过来；我会给他画一张图。他是一个成年人了；他可以自己建造电路，”Doc 厉声说道。
"Well, give it here; I'll make him a drawing. He's a grown man; he can build the circuit himself," Doc snapped.
Doc 很快就画出了电路图。我跑到走廊去复印了几份，然后回来把原件交给了他。
Doc sketched the circuit in a minute. I ran down the hall to make some copies, returned, and gave him the original.
比尔用一些小电线将电源盒的电线绑在盒子把手上。“这是我发明的一种专利方法，可以防止人们被电线绊倒，”他开玩笑说。
Bill tied the cords from the power supply box with some small wires attached to the box handle. "It's a patented method I've developed to prevent people from tripping over the cords," he joked.
当 Doc 和 Bill 把设备搬进我的怀里时，Doc 提出了借款条件。“我们不想借钱给那些不成功的人，所以现在努力工作，拍一些好照片吧，”他要求道。
As Doc and Bill loaded my arms with the equipment, Doc issued the conditions of the loan. "We don't like to lend to people who aren't successful, so work hard now and take some good pictures," he mandated.
“先生，我一周内就会给您一些。”我回答道。
"I'll have some for you in a week, sir," I answered.
我拐过街角来到 13 号楼，Doc 在办公室里再次劝告我：“到达目标！”
I turned the corner to Building 13 and Doc exhorted again from his office, "To the mark!"
5 月 25 日
May 25
我设置好宝丽来相机以及 Doc 和 Bill 的闪光灯。切特走进来，说道：“你在干什么？我们这里只是拍电影。你浪费时间干什么？”
I set up the Polaroid camera and Doc and Bill's flash. Chet walked in and said, "What are you doing? We're only taking movies here. What are you wasting your time for?"
“听着，切特，我只是想试试这个。我想看看如何制作速度更快的电影，埃杰顿教授建议我试试这个。谁知道呢，也许我们能学到一些东西，”我回答道。
"Look, Chet, I just want to give this a try. I wanted to see about making faster movies and Professor Edgerton suggested I try this instead. Who knows, we might learn something," I answered.
自从我当时关于不安装燃油喷射器的决定是正确的之后，我感到更加自信了，也更有能力与切特争论了。
I felt a little more confident, a little more able to talk back to Chet since the time I was right about not mounting the fuel injector.
“好吧，但不要花超过一天的时间。你必须拍摄燃烧视频，并获取压力数据并进行分析。我们必须让你离开这里，进入现实世界，”他说。
"Well, all right, but don't spend more than a day on it. You gotta make movies of combustion and take the pressure data and analyze it. We gotta get you outa here and into the real world," he said.
听着，切特，我知道你不认为我有博士学位的水平，但让我在这段时间里偶尔享受一下跟随自己直觉的乐趣吧。
Look, Chet, I know you don't think I'm Ph.D. caliber, but let me enjoy following my intuition once in a while for the duration.
“你需要帮助吗？”他问道。
"You need any help?" he asked.
“关键是时间。我需要闪光发生的百万分之一秒和注入持续的千分之一秒之间的时间。”我说道。
"The key is the timing. I need the fraction of the millionth of a second that the flash is on to occur within the thousandth of the second that the injection lasts," I said.
“剩下的实验就用我们已有的计时盒吧，”切特说，“把闪光灯放在一个计时盒上，把喷射器放在另一个计时盒上，然后像操作电影摄影机一样调节延迟时间。”
"Just use the timing boxes we have for the rest of the experiment," Chet said. "Put the strobe flash on one timing box and put the injector on the other timing box, and dial in the delay just as you did with the movie camera."
机械工程的高科技在于精确的空间。电气工程的高科技在于精确的时间。问题仍然存在，我们应该在喷射器启动和闪光开始之间设置多少千分之一秒的延迟？从计时箱指示喷射器启动的时间到喷射时间大约需要 42/1,000 秒，所以我向 Chet 提出了这个数字。
The high technology of mechanical engineering is in precise space. The high technology of electrical engineering is in precise time. The question remained, How many thousandths of a second delay should we put between when the injector starts and when the flash starts? The injector took about 42/1,000 of a second to inject from the time the timing box told it to start, so I suggested that number to Chet.
“不，”他有点随意地说道。“我们从 40 开始吧。”
"No," he said, kind of arbitrarily. "Let's start with 40."
我们拨了40。宝丽来胶片上没有燃料喷洒。
We dialed in 40. No fuel spray on the Polaroid film.
“现在试试45，”切特说。
"Now try 45," Chet said.
仍然没有燃油喷雾。
Still no fuel spray.
“四十三。”没有燃料。 “四十一。”没有燃料。 “四十四。”没有燃料。
"Forty-three." No fuel. "Forty-one." No fuel. "Forty-four." No fuel.
“四十二。”宝丽来照片上清晰地显示出燃料的图像。五架喷气机中的每一个都看起来像一小簇蓬松的白色棉花。它很美，比电影更清晰。Doc 是对的。
"Forty-two." A crisp sharp image of the fuel displayed itself on the Polaroid print. Each of the five jets looked like a tiny tuft of fluffy white cotton. It was beautiful, clearer than the movie. Doc was right.
章节
C H A P T E R
17
17
六人的喜悦
The Joy of Six
11……分别善恶树上的果子，你不可吃。……
11. . . of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it. . . ...
创世记 2:17
Genesis 2:17
日程：
Schedule:
1983 年夏季：6.001 计算机结构与解释
Summer '83: 6.001 Structure and Interpretation of Computer
语言（西伯特）
Languages (Siebert)
6.931 基础电子学（Zapf）
6.931 Basic Electronics (Zapf)
2.996 论文
2.996 Thesis
5 月 27 日
May 27
艾瑞和我去参加毕业典礼，听赫尔穆特·施密特的演讲。那天阴天，游行队伍里的教授们身穿学术长袍，戴着斯坦福、牛津、剑桥和麻省理工学院的兜帽，手握权杖，头戴滑稽的帽子。这一切看起来太中世纪了，仿佛巫师们在展示他们的权力。
Ari and I went to graduation to hear the speech by Helmut Schmidt. It was a cloudy day for the professors in the procession with their academic robes and their hoods from Stanford and Oxford and Cambridge and MIT, and their scepters and their funny hats. It all seemed so medieval, as if the wizards were displaying their power.
施密特从我身边走过，四名身穿黑色长袍、头戴朴素帽子的年轻人从他身旁走过。这四个年轻人看起来不像学者，眼神中没有学者的专注和智慧。他们不像那些戴着滑稽帽子的人那样向前看，而是抬头看着屋顶，看着基里安庭院周围的二楼、三楼和四楼的窗户。施密特也扫视着周围。
Schmidt marched past me, with four younger men in plain black caps and gowns marching on all four sides of him. The four younger ones didn't look like scholars; there wasn't the focus and intelligence in their eyes. And instead of looking forward like the people in funnier hats, they looked up at the rooftops, at the second, third, and fourth floor windows around Killian Court. Schmidt scanned the periphery as well.
这五个人看上去很紧张。我不知道他们是不是在心里默默地复习了一下如果有刺杀企图的话的行动：施密特会先着地，然后两个人会跳到他身上掩护他，另外两个人会从长袍下面掏出乌兹冲锋枪，向刺杀者开火。不过，安保人员肯定已经对这一区域进行了消毒，保镖只是一个多余的系统。
The five looked tense. I wondered whether they were mentally reviewing the choreography if there were an attempted hit: Schmidt would hit the deck first, then two would jump on top of him to cover him, and the other two would whip out their Uzis from under their robes and open fire on the would-be assasin. Surely the security sweep had sterilized the area, though, and the bodyguards were only a redundant system.
他们平安无事地登上了舞台。观众席上几位年长的家长轻声唱起了《星条旗》，我则大声唱了起来，就像我在童子军中学会歌词以来唱的一样。国歌唱完后，我前排的一个人说：“开始比赛吧。”
They reached the stage without incident. A few of the older parents in the audience softly sang "The Star Spangled Banner," and I sang it loudly the way I had ever since I'd learned the words in Cub Scouts. When the anthem ended, a guy in the row in front of me said, "Play ball."
施密特演讲到一半时，舞台后面传来声音。“咔哒，咚。”卷轴从 10 号楼爱奥尼亚柱之间的雕带上掉下来。“什么也没有。”
Midway through Schmidt's speech, the sounds came from behind the stage. "Click, thunk." The scroll fell from the frieze between the Ionic columns of Building 10. "NOTHING'S."
“咔哒，咚。”“不可能。”
"Click, thunk." "IMPOSSIBLE."
THA 得一分。干得好，Ghan。
Score one for THA. Nice work, Ghan.
Course Six 是电气工程系。这里是权力所在。校长 Paul Gray ('54) 最初在 Six 担任教授。工程系主任 Gerry Wilson 是 Six 的教授。当然，Doc Edgerton 也在 Course Six 工作。Course Six 发明了雷达、人工智能和计算机。Course Six 是高科技。
Course Six is the Electrical Engineering department. This is where the power is. Paul Gray ('54), president, got his start as a professor in Six. Gerry Wilson, dean of engineering, was a professor in Six. And, of course, Doc Edgerton was in Course Six. Course Six invented radar, artificial intelligence, and computers. Course Six is high technology.
7 月 20 日
July 20
软件。大一学生需要花六百零一（也就是六百零一无趣）才能学会用 LISP（LISt 处理，或大量阴险而愚蠢的括号）编程。这也是他们开始在解决问题和使事情运转的能力上超越世界其他地方的地方。
Software. Freshman double E's take six double oh one (a.k.a. six double no fun) to learn to program in LISP (LISt Processing, or Lots of Insidious and Stupid Parentheses). This is also where they begin to leave the rest of the world behind them in their ability to solve problems and to make things work.
我听说过很多关于高级宿舍里的六年级牛奶和饼干课程，所以我想体验一下，哪怕只是间接体验。在麻省理工学院，任何不评分的东西都是间接体验，因为你需要其他学生的压力、测验和评分问题集来迫使你吸收所呈现的大量数据。为期两周的暑期课程将让我有足够多的间接体验。
I'd heard so much about Six at milk and cookies in Senior House that I wanted to experience it, if only vicariously. Anything that is not graded is vicarious at MIT, because you need the pressure of the other students and the quizzes and the graded problem sets to force you to absorb the mountain of data presented. The two week summer version would give me a big enough vicarious taste.
课程 6 的地下指南指出：“6.001 不是一门编程课程 - 它教你如何思考复杂性。” 也许它会实现米基克教授两年前在第一周对我的承诺。
The underground guide to Course Six noted: "6.001 is not a programming course-it teaches you how to think about complexity." Perhaps it would fulfill Professor Mikic's promise to me in that first week two years ago.
西伯特教授比吉夫托普罗斯和格林年轻一点，说话很有气势，看起来更像财富 500 强公司的高管，而不是计算机科学教授。但他的举止并不妨碍他传输数据的能力。
Professor Siebert was a little younger than Gyftopoulos and Greene; he spoke forcefully, and seemed more like a Fortune 500 executive than a computer science professor. But his manner didn't hinder his ability to transfer the data.
“抽象，”他说。“就是这个词。当你设计计算机程序，或者设计任何东西时，你都需要进行抽象。”
"Abstraction," he said. "That is the word. When you go about designing a computer program, or designing anything for that matter, you need to make abstractions."
对。什么是抽象？我以为我在这方面取得了进展。
Right. What's an abstraction? And I thought I was making progress in this place.
西伯特继续说，我们可能已经熟悉了黑匣子这个术语。向其输入一个或多个电子信号的东西被称为黑匣子。信号可以像汽车电池电压一样简单，也可以像无线电波一样复杂。黑匣子对这些输入信号进行操作以提供输出信号。它之所以被称为黑匣子，是因为你不知道黑匣子如何执行操作，但你确实知道操作的内容。黑匣子概念是在模拟电子技术的早期发展起来的，当时它们在许多情况下实际上是黑色的金属盒子。
Siebert went on to say that we might already be familiar with the term black box. A thing to which you give an electronic signal or signals is referred to as as a black box. A signal can be as simple as the voltage from a car battery or as complex as a radio wave. The black box operates on these input signals to give you an output signal. It's called a black box because you don't know how the black box performs the operation, but you do know what the operation is. The black box concept was developed in the early days of analog electronics, when they were, in many cases, literally black metal boxes.
就像 Doc Edgerton 实验室里的那些。我不需要确切地知道 EG&G 频闪盒内的电容器和其他电子元件设备是如何工作的；我只需要知道这些盒子的作用以及如何将它们与我的实验连接起来。
Like those in Doc Edgerton's lab. I didn't have to know precisely how the capacitors and other electronic component devices inside the EG&G strobe boxes worked; I only needed to know what the boxes did and how to interface them with my experiment.
抽象就是这个词。来自 abstractus，意为“脱离”。抽象是将某事物视为一般特征的行为，与具体现实、特定对象或实际实例无关。在 6.001 的语言中，抽象也是一般特征本身、功能或操作。
Abstraction is the word. From abstractus, "To drag away from." Abstraction is the act of considering something as a general characteristic, apart from concrete realities, specific objects, or actual instances. In the language of 6.001, an abstraction is also the general characteristic itself, the function or the operation.
因此，抽象就是进行抽象、制造黑箱的过程。通过抽象，你可以将繁重、复杂、难以处理的问题或系统划分为更小、更易于处理的部分。
So abstraction is the process of making abstractions, making black boxes. You divide a heavy, complex intractable problem or system into smaller, tractable pieces by abstraction.
一旦您将较小的部分从较大的整体中分离出来，并找到了抽象的一般特征或输出和输入之间的关系，您就可以链接抽象以获得更复杂的抽象。
Once you've dragged the smaller pieces away from the larger whole, and found the general characteristics, or the relationship between output and input for the abstraction, you can link the abstractions to attain a more complex abstraction.
是的，但是熵又如何呢？
Yes, but what about entropy?
他继续说道：“对于每一个抽象，你都需要定义一个‘抽象障碍’，即抽象的界限。”
"With every abstraction, you need to define an 'abstraction barrier,' i.e., the limits of the abstraction," he continued.
汽车可以看作是一种抽象概念。它有重量、排放量、长度和宽度，这些都是土木工程师和公路规划人员要处理的。但汽车本身是抽象概念的集合。你可以称发动机为抽象概念。变速器是抽象概念，轮胎也是抽象概念。每个抽象概念都有性能特征，工程团队可以对其进行建模。
An automobile can be thought of as an abstraction. It has a weight and emissions and a length and a width that civil engineers and highway planners deal with. But the car itself is a collection of abstractions. You could call the engine an abstraction. The transmission is an abstraction, and the tires are abstractions. Each abstraction has performance characteristics that can be modeled by an engineering group.
模型。关键词。因此，抽象就像一个模型。系统模型可能由较小系统或子系统的链接模型组成。
Model. Key word. So an abstraction is like a model. And a model of a system may be composed of linked models of smaller systems, or subsystems.
“现在在设计中，”西伯特教授说，“任务是定义抽象和抽象障碍。”
"Now in design," Professor Siebert said, "the task will be to define the abstractions and the abstraction barriers."
您还需要在抽象障碍之间建立清晰的接口；这将使不止一个人能够在大型复杂系统上高效工作。这是古老的分而治之方法。任何技术都由相互关联的抽象组成，其理念是以可管理的方式划分抽象。
You will also need to have clean interfaces between the abstraction barriers; this will enable more than one person to work productively on a large, complex system. It's the old divide-andconquer approach. Any technology consists of linked abstractions, and the idea is to divide the abstractions in a manageable way.
这就是 Chet、Scott 和我对 RCM 所做的工作。我负责前半部分、燃料系统、透明窗口设计、喷嘴设计和电影摄影机，而 Chet 和 Scott 负责机器的后半部分及其所有附属子系统。因此，我可以发明和修补前半部分，感觉自己就像旧时的发明家一样，而 Scott 和 Chet 则负责机器的后半部分。一旦我们的两个系统工作正常，我们就会用我无知地组装的计时电子设备来编排整个实验过程。
This is what Chet and Scott and I had done with the RCM. I'd picked up the front half, the fuel system, the clear window design, the nozzle design, and the movie camera, while Chet and Scott had taken the rear half of the machine and all its attendant subsystems. Thus I could invent and tinker in the front half and feel like the old-time inventors, while Scott and Chet did the same in the rear half of the machine. Once our two systems worked, we would choreograph the whole process of the experiment with the timing electronics I had ignorantly assembled.
这种层次的细分有其局限性。它进入了现实世界，工程师和科学家被分而治之，只允许他们知道生产指定抽象所需的细胞信息。随着他们在公司树的树枝上不断攀升，他们掌握的信息越来越多，视野也更开阔。他们发现，一旦他们知道如何做所有的部分，整个事情就相当简单了，如果他们签署的非竞争协议不够严格，他们就会与其他一些抽象概念组建一家衍生公司。就像约翰·德罗宁 (John Delorean) 所做的那样。
This level of subdivision has its limits. It works its way into the real world, where engineers and scientists are divided and conquered by allowing them only to know the cellular information they need to produce their assigned abstraction. As they climb the branches of the corporate tree, they are privy to more and more information, a broader view. They see that the whole thing is pretty easy once they know how to do all its parts, and if the noncompetition agreement they sign is not tight enough they form a spinoff company with some of the other abstractions. As John Delorean did.
更进一步。在汽车装配厂无意识地拧动螺栓是一种抽象概念，很容易教会机器人。而且机器人永远不会吸食可卡因。
It goes further. Turning a bolt mindlessly at a car assembly plant is an abstraction, easy enough to teach a robot. And a robot will never snort cocaine.
西伯特的更多演讲。“我们鼓励你随心所欲地思考。”
More Siebert lecture. "We encourage you to think wishfully."
当你解决问题时，一厢情愿的想法会帮助你定义适当的子问题。一厢情愿的想法就是说：“如果我有一个东西可以做这样那样的事情，那不是很好吗？”一旦你知道你想要什么，就很容易得到它。一旦你命名了一个精神，你就有权力控制它。你只需一遍又一遍地重复这个问题，寻找答案，把问题分解成越来越小的部分。最终，你会到达一个点，你可以真正解决其中的一两个部分，或者你的一个下属可以解决。大型系统的诀窍是编排或协调它，以便所有问题都在或多或少正确的时间得到解决，人们不会坐着等待其他抽象来为他们提供他们需要的信息来做下一件事。这就是我们所说的自上而下的编程。通过不让自己在细节中迷失到后来，你可以让拖延成为解决问题过程中富有成效的一部分。
When you're solving a problem, wishful thinking will help you define the appropriate subproblems. Wishful thinking is simply saying, "Wouldn't it be nice if I had a thing that did such and such a thing." Once you know what you want, it's easy enough to get it. Once you name a spirit, you have power over it. You just keep saying that question over and over again, looking for the answer, breaking the problem down into smaller and smaller pieces. Eventually you get to the point where you can actually solve one or two of the pieces, or one of your subordinates can. The trick with large systems is to choreograph or orchestrate it so that all the problems are solved at more or less the right time and people aren't sitting around waiting for some other abstraction to give them the information they need to do the next thing they need to do. This is what we mean by top-down programming. You make procrastination a productive part of the problem-solving process by not losing yourself in the fine details until later.
我记得比利时的自行车博物馆，那里展示了技术发展的一个又一个创新。“Ainsi naquit la bicyclette”：“自行车就这样诞生了”，十八世纪第一辆自行车上的标签上写道。图中戴着大礼帽的男子跨坐在钢制两轮车上。没有踏板、没有刹车、没有轮胎。实际上，它是一种跑步辅助工具。所以它回答了一个令人渴望的问题，如果我跑步时不受腿长的限制，而是可以定期给地球一个推动力，与腿长的人平等竞争，那不是很好吗？
I remembered the bicycle museum in Belgium, where the technology development was displayed innovation by innovation. "Ainsi naquit la bicyclette": "Thus was born the bicycle," the label on the first example from the eighteenth century said. The men in top hats straddled steel two-wheelers in the diagram. There were no pedals, no brakes, no tires. In effect it was a running aid. So it answered the wishful question, Wouldn't it be nice if, when I ran, I weren't limited by the length of my legs, but rather could give the earth a push at regular intervals and compete with longerlegged people equally?
第二系列有轮胎，这必定回答了这个一厢情愿的问题：如果我的自行车没有那么疼，那不是很好吗？接下来是高轮自行车，这回答了这个问题：当我可以像所有大型机械一样摇动车轮时，用力推离地面，是不是有点愚蠢？接下来是两轮现代“安全自行车”，这回答了这个问题：如果我每次从高轮自行车上摔下来时不必摔破头，那不是很好吗？
The second series had tires, which must have answered the wishful question, Wouldn't it be nice if my push-bike didn't hurt so much? followed by the penny farthing, which answered the question, Isn't it sort of stupid to be pushing off the ground when I can crank a wheel like all the big mechanical machines do?, followed by the two-wheeled, modern-day "safety bicycle," which answered the question, Wouldn't it be nice if I didn't have to crack my head open every time I fell off my penny farthing?
更多 Siebert 讲座。“现在，在 LISP 中，就像在任何语言中一样，我们处理原语、组合方法和抽象方法，以及习语或常见的使用模式。”
More Siebert lecture. "Now, in LISP, as in any language, we deal with primitives, means of combination, and means of abstraction, and also with idioms, or common patterns of usage."
LISP 是一种速度较慢的语言，但是一旦你掌握了它，阅读和理解程序就变得非常容易，因为程序员的时间是最昂贵的部分，而在芯片中触发逻辑门打开和关闭所需的电力相对便宜。
LISP is a slow language, but once you know it, it's very easy to read and understand a program because the programmer's time is the expensive part and the electricity needed to fire the logic gates open and closed in the chips is relatively cheap.
西伯特说：“大型系统的关键在于沟通。”
"The key with large systems is communication," Siebert said.
您希望现在快速有效地与小组其他成员沟通，这样您就不会浪费时间向其他人解释混乱的逻辑。此外，其他人可能是您稍后（周末之后，当您再次回到问题时）并且如果您的代码不清楚，您就会原地踏步，试图回到周五的状态。
You want to communicate with other members of your group now quickly and efficiently so you don't waste time explaining messy logic to someone else. Besides, the someone else may be you later on-after the weekend when you come back to the problem-and if your code isn't clear you'll spin your wheels trying just to get back to where you were on Friday.
“但我们可以聊一整天，”他说。“计算机实验室里的机器可以让你变得更聪明。”
"But we could talk all day," he said. "The machines in the computer lab are here to smarten you up."
问题集可以帮助你掌握知识，坐在机器前努力理解所呈现的概念是掌握知识的最佳方法。当你坐在机器前时，机器就是你的老师、你的字典；机器就是你的同义词典；机器就是你的 EB White 的《风格要素》。为什么？因为任何语法错误、拼写错误或用法错误的东西根本行不通，你必须一次又一次地尝试，直到成功。西伯特说，如果我们真的遇到困难，实验室里会有一些导师来帮助我们。他们坐在教室后面。
The problem sets help you achieve mastery, and sitting at the machines trying to wrap your mind around the concepts presented is the best thing you can do to attain mastery. When you are at the machine, the machine is your teacher, your dictionary; the machine is your thesaurus; the machine is your version of E. B. White's The Elements of Style. Why? Because anything that is bad grammar or bad spelling or bad usage simply does not work, and you have to try again and again until it does work. Siebert said that there would be some tutors in the lab to help us if we really get stuck. They were sitting at the back of the classroom.
在实验室里。这些电脑是花栗鼠，由比尔·休利特（1936 年）-帕卡德捐赠给麻省理工学院。这些东西有点像巨型个人电脑，如果是商用的话，每台价值 50,000 美元。但当然，这些成本毫无意义，因为每隔几年它们就会下降 2 倍。它们都排列在 EG&G 大楼 34 号楼的一个大房间里。我不知道他们为什么叫它们花栗鼠，除非这是对机器用户，即芯片僧侣的嘲讽。没有一个人叫阿尔文，所以不是这样。
In the lab. The computers were Chipmunks, donated to MIT by Bill Hewlett ('36)-Packard. These things were sort of megapersonal computers, each worth $50,000 if it were commercially available. But, of course, these costs mean nothing because they are coming down by a factor of 2 every couple of years. They were all lined up in a big room in the EG&G building, Building 34. I don't know why they called them Chipmunks, unless it was a jab at the users of the machines, the chip monks. None of them was named Alvin, so that wasn't it.
那里有五十台机器，但没多少台有人，所以我坐下来，试着弄清楚如何登录。这比格林计算机室里的苹果电脑要棘手一点，因为 (1) 没有软盘可以输入，(2) 机器已经开机了。屏幕上什么也没有，甚至连一个闪烁的小矩形光标都没有。
There were fifty machines and not a lot of them were occupied so I sat down and tried to figure out how to log on. It was a little trickier than the Apple in Greene's computer room, because (1) there was no floppy disk to enter, and (2) the machine was already on. There was nothing on the screen, not even a little flashing rectangular cursor.
我翻阅了机器的指南，寻找“按任意键启动”或“键入‘ENTER’启动”的说明。没有任何线索。它没有写在黑板上。它是如此明显，如此常识，如此傻瓜式的概念，每个人都应该直观地知道如何启动。
I thumbed through the guide to the machine, looking for an instruction that said, "Press any key to start" or "Type 'ENTER' to start." There were no clues anywhere. It wasn't written on the blackboard. It is so obvious, such common knowledge, such an idiotproof concept that everyone should know intuitively how to start.
经过半个小时反复阅读手册和查看笔记后，我向 19 岁的助教寻求帮助。是的，向一个说话含糊其辞的二年级学生寻求帮助是件很丢脸的事，但年龄与能力无关。
After half an hour of reading and rereading the manual and looking through my notes, I asked the nineteen-year-old teaching assistant. Yes, it is humiliating to ask a mealymouthed sophomore for help, but age has nothing to do with ability.
“按空格键，”他回答道。
"Hit the space bar," he answered.
天哪。我早该知道的。今天的问题是，定义一个过程（LISP 表示“编写程序”），以三个 (3) 个数字作为参数，并返回两个 (2) 个较大数字的平方和。这个问题在笔记的第一章，所以按定义来说很容易。不，其实并不简单。
Golly. I should have known that. The problem of the day was, Define a procedure (LISP for "write a program") that takes three (3) numbers as arguments and returns the sum of squares of the two (2) larger numbers. The problem was in the first chapter of the notes so it was by definition easy. No, it wasn't.
怎么办？我盯着黑白屏幕上烦人地闪烁的小光标，仿佛在说：“来吧，慢性子，你让我厌烦了。”
How to proceed? I stared at the little bar cursor on the black and white screen that flashed annoyingly, as if to say, "Come on, slowpoke, you're boring me."
是时候做些美好的幻想了。但首先，要翻译问题陈述中的关键词。这就是人工智能实验室的研究人员在向 LISP 机器输入高中代数教科书中的“应用题”时让机器做的事情（例如，“约翰的年龄是他父亲的四分之一。十年后，约翰的年龄将是他父亲的三分之一。当约翰的年龄是他父亲的一半时，他有多大？”）。
Time for wishful thinking. But first, translate key words in the problem statement. This is what the people in the artificial intelligence lab make their LISP machines do when they feed them "word problems" from high school algebra textbooks (e.g., "John is one-fourth as old as his father. In ten years John will be onethird the age of his father. How old will John be when he's half as old as his father?").
关键词是参数和返回。参数是其他计算机编程课程所称的输入，例如 cos(x) 中的 x。返回是其他人所称的“输出”。但这是麻省理工学院，我们有自己的术语，而且我们的术语比其他人都好。
The key words are argument and return. An argument is what other computer programming classes would call an input-for example, x in cos (x). Return is what the rest of the world would call "output." But this is MIT and we have our own terms here, and our terms are better than anyone else's.
因此，问题陈述意味着 (1) 取任意三个数字；(2) 找出哪两个较大的数字；(3) 将每个较大的数字乘以自身；(4) 将 (3) 的结果相加。
So the problem statement means (1) take any three numbers; (2) figure out which are the two bigger ones; (3) multiply each of the bigger ones by itself; (4) add together the results of (3).
现在到了做梦的时间了。如果我有一个魔盒，可以算出任意三个数字中较大的两个，那不是很好吗？如果我有另一个魔盒，可以算出我放入其中的任何两个数字的平方和，那不是很好吗？那不是很好吗？也许那时……我记不起海滩男孩这首歌的其他歌词了。
Now it's time for wishful thinking. Wouldn't it be nice if I had a magic box that figured out the larger two of any three numbers? Wouldn't it be nice if I had another magic box that would make the sum of the squares of whatever two numbers I put into it? Wouldn't it be nice? Maybe then ... I couldn't remember the rest of the words to the Beach Boys' song.
我知道我不知道什么，如果你明白我的意思。如果你确切地知道你不知道什么，你可以画一个框，并称之为程序，然后发明它的细节。西伯特强调的想法是易读性，现在与我的同事沟通，以后与我自己沟通。他们允许你随意给框起名字，所以我把其中一个框称为“求平方和”。我把另一个框称为“找出三个中更大的两个”。我按名字呼唤灵魂，并控制它们。
I knew what I didn't know, if you know what I mean. If you precisely know what you don't know you can draw a box and call that a procedure and invent the details of it. The idea that Siebert stressed was legibility, communication to my colleagues now and myself later. They allow you to make the names of the boxes as long as you want, so I called one of the boxes "Makesum-of-squares." I called the other box "Find-bigger-two-ofthree." I called the spirits by name and had power over them.
我在高中学习过函数，例如 cos(x)、“x 的余弦”，而 LISP 让我能够发明具有多个参数的函数。这真是个很棒的概念，老兄。强大。优雅。聪明。这些词在 Chipmunk 房间里流传。我在 Apple 上所做的很酷，它是迭代的，但与这种语言相比真的很笨拙——如果我能熟练掌握它的话。如果这还不够棒的话，LISP 还使您能够无限地创建函数的函数的函数的函数。它几乎将高等数学带到了现实生活中。
I'd learned functions in high school, such as cos(x), "cosine of x," and LISP empowered me to invent functions with more than one argument. Awesome concept, dude. Powerful. Elegant. Clever. These are words that floated around the Chipmunk room. What I'd done on the Apple was cool, it was iterative, but it was really clumsy compared to this language-if I could ever become fluent in it. And as if that weren't awesome enough, LISP enables you to make functions of functions of functions of functions ad infin- itum. It almost brought higher mathematics to earth.
我的工作是给这些灵魂命名，然后驯服它们，让它们屈服，抓住它们的大腿窝，就像天使对雅各所做的那样。
My job, having named the spirits, was to tame them, to bring them into submission, to grab them by the hollow of the thigh as the angel did to Jacob.
驯服它们就如同发明它们或对它们进行编程一样。因此，是时候移动光标了。
To tame them is the same as inventing them, or programming them. So time to move the cursor.
定义寻找三者中较大的两个 (ABC)
DEFINE FIND-BIGGER-TWO-OF-THREE (A B C)
a、b、c 是程序可以作为输入的任意数字的符号。我翻遍了笔记、手册和前一年解决的问题，试图找到如何编写解决方案的模式。
a, b, c, were symbols for the arbitrary numbers the program could take as input. I fished through the notes, through the manuals, through the solved problems from the year before to try to capture the pattern of how to write a solution.
方法是找到一个类似的问题，你有答案，然后尝试模仿它，尝试稍微改变它，也许运气好就能找到答案。如果答案和书中的一样，你可以自欺欺人地认为你学到了一些东西。然而，这是次优的（第六课显然没有听过威尔逊教授对次优的定义，即重新安排泰坦尼克号上的甲板椅；他们对次优的定义是“不太理想”），次优是因为当你模仿表面图案以及如何改变它们时，你唯一学到的东西就是它们是什么样子的，以及如何从问题集或测试的评分者那里骗取一些部分学分。
The approach is to find a similar problem for which you have the answer and try to mimic it, try to change it a little bit, and maybe luck out and reach an answer. If the answer is like the one in the book you can fool yourself into thinking you're learning something. However, this is and was suboptimal (Course Six evidently had not heard Professor Wilson's definition of suboptimization as rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic; their definition of suboptimal was "less than optimal"), suboptimal because the only thing you learn when you mimic surface patterns and how to change them is what they look like and how to sleaze some partial credit points out of the grader of the problem set or the test.
但真正学习、内化知识的唯一方法是集中精力、专注，将问题分解成最简单的部分，然后根据问题的各个部分构建解决方案。集中精力很难，但如果你能做到这一点，剩下的就很容易了。这就像答案是一颗核桃，你拿着一把核桃镐，想把核桃从壳里拔出来。你可以刮擦表面，一点一点地从核桃顶部拔出小块，然后把壳的其他小块混在一起，或者你可以绕着核桃的边缘工作，寻找可以像剥过熟的水果一样把它从壳里整个剥下来的地方。也许这就是诺姆·乔姆斯基教授所说的“表面”结构和“深层”结构。
But the only way really to learn, to internalize the knowledge, is to concentrate, to focus, and to break the problem down into its simplest pieces and then build the solution up out of the problem's pieces. It's hard to focus, but if you can do that, the rest is easy. It's like the answer is a walnut and you have a walnut pick and you're trying to pull the walnut out of the shell. You can either scratch at the surface and pull little pieces off the top of the nut, bit by bit, and mix other little pieces of the shell with it, or you can work around the edge of the nut, looking for places to loosen it whole from the shell like an overripe fruit. Maybe this is what Professor Noam Chomsky meant by "surface" structure and "deep" structure.
我再次向这位说话含糊其辞的大二学生寻求帮助。
I asked the mealymouthed sophomore for help again.
“我正在尝试定义这个程序，它将使用‘大于’符号返回较大的两个数字，”我说。
"I'm trying to define this procedure that will return the bigger two numbers by using 'greater than' signs," I said.
“机器不会返回那样的两个数字，”他快速说道。“嗯，实际上它可以，但我们不会告诉你怎么做。这只会让你感到困惑。你为什么不尝试使用‘min’或‘max’程序呢？它们在第三章。”
"The machine won't return two numbers like that," he said rapid-fire. "Well, actually it can, but we won't be telling you how. It would only confuse you. Why don't you try using the procedures 'min' or 'max'? They're in chapter three."
在那里，我遵循了狭隘、有限、连续的看待事物的方式，错误地认为既然问题在第一章，那么解决它所需的所有材料也都会在第一章中。麻省理工学院的情况并非如此。这是他们诱骗你提前阅读的方式。
There I'd gone along with that narrow, limited, sequential way of looking at things and wrongly assumed that since the problem was in chapter one, all the material I would need to solve it would also be in chapter one. Not so at MIT. This is their way of tricking you into reading ahead.
因此，我应用了一次“max”，然后将“max”应用于剩下的两个数字，对两个结果数字求平方并将它们相加。
And so I applied "max" once, then applied "max" to the remaining two numbers, squared the two resulting numbers and added them together.
虽然尝试了几次，但 Chipmunk 手册中有一段话却一如既往地低调：
It took several tries, though, and a paragraph in the Chipmunk manual was characteristically understated:
“调试：在程序的演进过程中，你会多次发现程序并不完全正确。不要将这些错误归咎于程序，而要归咎于被称为 bug 的奇怪生物（在晶体管出现之前，当计算机非常庞大时，当“电子管”放大信号时，问题是由线路中的真实 bug 引起的）。这样，程序员就不会感到内疚。调试就像编程一样，是一种后天习得的技能和艺术。”
"Debugging: It will become apparent to you many times during a program's evolution that the program is not entirely right. Instead of blaming the program for these faults, strange creatures called bugs are blamed (back before the transistor, when computers were huge, when 'tubes' amplified signals, problems were caused by real bugs caught in the wires). In this way the programmer remains free of guilt. Debugging, like programming, is an acquired skill and an art."
一旦你知道如何去做，一切都会变得简单。
Everything's easy once you know how to do it.
7 月 21 日
July 21
西伯特：“今天的口头禅是‘递归’。”
Siebert: "The mantra for today is 'recursion.' "
思考递归的方式是，你有一套东欧制造的娃娃，其中一个娃娃看起来像另一个，但是更小一些，可以装在里面。现在假设最里面的娃娃上有你想要的东西。进一步假设每个娃娃都有一把钥匙可以打开下一层内层，进一步假设你的老板对你说，你不仅想要最里面娃娃身上的东西，还希望你完成后娃娃和里面的娃娃是一样的。于是你用你的钥匙打开一号娃娃，用一号娃娃的钥匙打开二号娃娃，然后用二号娃娃的钥匙打开三号娃娃，依此类推，直到到达最里面的娃娃。然后你沿着进来的路返回，直到得到结果和一套完全组装好的娃娃。递归的美妙之处在于，您可以以一种让您可以将问题视为性质相似的嵌套子问题的方式来构建计算机对问题的解决方案。
The way to think of recursion is that you have a set of dolls that they make in Eastern Europe, where one doll looks like the other one but is smaller and fits inside it. Now suppose there's something on the innermost doll that you want. Suppose further that each doll has a key to open up the next inner layer, and suppose further that your boss said to you, not only do you want the thing that's on the innermost doll, but also you want the dolls to be the same after you're done. So you use your key to open up doll number one, use doll number one's key to open up doll number two, then use doll number two's key to open up doll number three, et cetera, until you reach the innermost doll. Then you come back the way you went in until you have your result and a fully assembled doll set again. The beauty of recursion is that you structure the computer's solution to the problem in a way that lets you see the problem as nested subproblems of a similar nature.
Siebert 说，当你想编写程序时，一个有用的技巧是手写解决问题的所有步骤，并在解决方案中寻找模式。当你捕捉到那个模式时，试着用英语说出你希望程序做什么。然后试着编程。最终，你会变得足够流利，你可以坐在机器前编写代码，而不需要经过中间步骤。但如果你按照建议的方法去做，可能会节省调试时间。
Siebert said that when you want to write your programs, one useful technique is to write down all the steps in solving the problem by hand and look for the pattern in the solution. When you capture that pattern, try to say in English what you want the program to do. Then try to program it. Eventually you'll become fluent enough that you can just sit down at the machine and compose code without going through the intermediate steps. But it may save debugging time if you approach it as suggested.
我记得比利时数学教授说过，数学家所做的就是把所有步骤都写出来，然后把它浓缩成别人看不懂的形式。也许这就是为什么数学专业的学生觉得六零一很容易。
I remembered the Belgian mathematics professor's saying that what a mathematician does is write something out with all the steps and then condense it into a form that no one else can understand. Maybe that's why math majors find six double oh one easy.
西伯特接着举了一个“排序”程序的例子。排序程序在执行诸如按字母顺序排列列表之类的操作时很有用。假设你试图在文件系统中整理一些顺序。假设你有一千个项目需要分类。首先，你选择十个左右的类别，然后浏览这些类别并将项目放入每个类别中。然后，你浏览这十个类别并为它们创建子类别，依此类推，直到你将所有内容都放在易于查找的文件中。
Siebert went on to an example of a "sort" routine. A sort routine is useful in doing things like putting lists in alphabetical order. Say you're trying to put some order in your filing system. Say you have one thousand items to categorize. First you pick ten or so categories, and go through the pile and put things in each of the piles. Then you go through the ten piles and make up subcategories for them, and so on, until you have everything in easily findable files.
知识就是力量，信息就是力量，但迅速获取知识和信息才是真正的力量。
Knowledge is power, information is power, but speedy access to knowledge and information is real power.
他继续说道：“我们正在用技术来帮助你管理复杂性。”
"We're helping you with techniques to manage complexity," he continued.
他说，这些都是简单的技术，但当你将它们结合起来时，你的程序可能会开始拥有自己的生命。你输入一些东西，输出会让你感到惊讶，但它是真实的。然后你输入其他东西，你会再次感到惊讶。你在系统中构建了如此多的复杂性，以至于你无法理解正在发生的事情。因此，任何足够先进的技术都与魔术无异。
He said that these are simple techniques, but when you link them, your programs may begin to take on a life of their own. You'll input something and the output will surprise you but it will be real. Then you'll input something else and you'll be surprised again. You build so much complexity into a system that you cannot understand what is happening. And so any sufficiently advanced technology becomes indistinguishable from magic.
是的，但是魔术师掌控魔法，而我想成为一名魔术师。
Yes, but the magician controls the magic, and I want to be a magician.
7 月 28 日
July 28
等待答辩开始时，我问斯隆实验室教室里坐着的那个外国人模样的男人：“你是哪里人？”
"Where are you from?" I asked the foreign-looking man seated in the Sloan Lab classroom, while we waited for the defense to begin.
“32号楼。”
"Building 32."
阿里已经完成了他的博士研究，并将完成的手稿交给了审查委员会。按照中世纪牛津的惯例，他将在公开答辩中展示他的研究成果。然后，他的委员会将私下商议，决定这项研究是否达到麻省理工学院的水平，并让他成为一名医生。
Ari had finished his Ph.D. research and had delivered the completed manuscript to his review committee. As is the custom dating from medieval Oxford, he would present his research in a public defense. His committee would then confer privately, decide whether the research were MIT-quality, and make him a doctor.
阿里的陈述非常圆滑、肯定、令人信服。切特、斯科特、本、32 号楼的外国人和其他听众离开了房间，去参加讨论。五分钟后，门开了，委员会主席说：“祝贺你，所罗门博士。”
Ari's presentation was polished, affirmative, convincing. Chet, Scott, Ben, the foreigner from Building 32, and the rest of the audience left the room for the deliberations. Five short minutes later the door opened and the committee chairman said, "Congratulations, Doctor Solomon."
7 月 30 日。我帮阿里把箱子装进他的车里。感觉就像我从未有过的哥哥要去上大学一样。
July 30. I helped Ari load the boxes into his car. It felt as if the older brother I never had were going away to college.
“你知道他们对我做了什么吗？”他说，“我论文中的所有费用，我以为补助金肯定会支付的，但这里平面艺术系的账单竟然高达 6,800 美元。我必须支付这笔费用，否则我就拿不到学位，浪费了我三年的生命。”
"You know what they did to me?" he said. "All the figures in my thesis, the ones I thought surely the grant would pay for, the bill from the Graphic Arts department here came to $6,800. And I have to pay it or I don't get the degree and I wasted three years of my life."
“好吧，安，你知道他们怎么称呼这个。”
"Well, An, you know what they call that."
“怎么了，我的朋友？”
"What, my friend?"
“研究所螺丝。”
"The Institute Screw."
“我会想念你的，我的朋友。”
"I will miss you, my friend."
“我也是，安。我也是。”
"And I you, An. And I you."
日程：
Schedule:
1983 年秋季：2.31 材料强度（Ghandi）
Fall '83: 2.31 Strength of Materials (Ghandi)
6.111 数字电子实验室（Troxel）（审核）
6.111 Digital Electronics Lab (Troxel) (audit)
2.996 论文
2.996 Thesis
硬件
Hardware
9 月 10 日
September 10
“你好再见”
"Hello Goodbye"
-约翰·列侬 - 保罗·麦卡特尼
-JOHN LENNON-PAUL MCCARTNEY
六一十一。六号课程是二七十的版本，只是难度增加了一百倍。这是 20 世纪 70 年代初发明第一款电子游戏的课程。我看到高级宿舍的孩子们每天晚上（包括周五和周六）整夜都在研究他们的书呆子工具包，公文包大小的盒子，在芯片旁边插入电线。我想知道他们在做什么。
Six one eleven. Course Six's version of two seventy, only a hundred times harder. This is the course wherein the first video game was invented in the early 1970s. I'd seen kids at Senior House at all hours of the night, every night, Friday and Saturday included, poring over their nerd kits, the briefcase-size boxes, poking wires into them next to the chips. I wanted to find out what they were up to.
课程 Six 的地下指南说：“6.111 是一门关于数字电子电路设计和调试的实用‘动手’实验课程。你在这门课上的表现很大程度上取决于能否让各种实验室运转起来。因此，尽管从未专门教授过调试能力，但它却是至关重要的。... 随着课程的进展，材料和相关实验室的难度迅速增加；事实上，这种增加速度如此之快，以至于讲座往往落后于 [轻描淡写]。不幸的是，助教的需求量很大，所以等待一个多小时只是为了被选中是很常见的，更不用说寻求帮助了 [你只能靠自己了，孩子]。当然，课程的最后三分之一是臭名昭著的期末项目，它通常会填满所有可用的空闲时间 [轻描淡写]。只参加 6.111。”Six one eleven 是终极消防水带课程。
The underground guide to course Six said, "6.111 is a practical 'hands-on' lab course on the design and debugging of digital electronic circuits. How well you do in this course depends greatly on being able to get the various labs to work. Consequently, the ability to debug, though never specifically taught, is of prime importance. ... The difficulty of the material and the associated labs increases rapidly as the course progresses; so rapidly, in fact, that the lectures tend to fall behind [understatement].... Unfortunately, TAs are in high demand, so waits of over an hour are common just to be checked off, to say nothing of getting help [you're on your own, kid].... Of course, the final third of the course is devoted to the infamous final project, which usually grows to fill all available free time [understatement]. Take 6.111 with nothing else." Six one eleven is the ultimate fire hose course.
在去听讲座的路上，我路过一间教室。教授在黑板上画了一个电场，并在教室前面设置了产生电场的电路。他有一台调到噪音的晶体管收音机，就像蒂姆对永动机所做的那样，他描绘了电场的轮廓，其形状就像黑板上的图表一样。无形化为可见。Mens et Manus-心灵与手。
I walked past a classroom on the way to the lecture. The professor had drawn an electric field on the blackboard and had set up circuitry to generate that electric field in the front of the room. He had a transistor radio tuned to noise, as Tim did with the perpetual motion machine, and traced the outline of the field, whose shape was as in the diagram on the blackboard. The invisible made visible. Mens et Manus-Mind and Hand.
当每个人都回到座位时，特罗克塞尔教授正在擦黑板。我想，在麻省理工学院拥有终身教职却还要擦掉上一堂课的黑板，这一定有点丢脸。当然，上一堂课的教授可以擦掉他讲课时的黑板笔记，但他必须擦掉他之前的黑板笔记，该死的擦一次黑板笔记就够了。
Professor Troxel was erasing the blackboard as everyone went to his or her seat. It must be sort of humiliating, I thought, to have tenure at MIT and still have to erase the blackboard from the class before. Of course, the professor from the class before could have erased his blackboard notes from his lecture, but he had to erase the ones from before him and dammit one stint of blackboard erasing is enough.
我只是在旁听这堂课，他允许我旁听，这是一种很好的姿态，而且我是另一个部门的研究生，如果我帮助他，我绝不会被指责为拍马屁，所以我负责了一半的板子。
I was just auditing the class, and it was kind of a nice gesture that he allowed me to sit in, and I was a graduate student from another department and no way could I be accused of brownnosing if I helped him, so I took care of half of the boards.
讲座开始了。“这堂课没有课本，因为课本没有涵盖我们要讲的所有内容，”他说。“今天的讲座一部分讲布尔代数，一部分讲第一个实验室的组合逻辑。”
The lecture began. "There's no text for the class, because none covers everything we'll be covering," he said. "Today's lecture is partly on Boolean algebra, partly on laying out the combinational logic for the first lab."
布尔代数是组合逻辑的语言。乔治·布尔是一位英国数学家，大约在鲁道夫·狄塞尔在金比斯的时候，他开发了逻辑运算符，可以接收两个语句（真或假），并输出第三个语句（真或假）。最简单的是“与”门，它表示“如果 a 为真且 b 为真，则 c（输出）也为真。如果 a 或 b 或 a 和 b 都为假，则输出为假。”
Boolean algebra is the language of combinational logic. George Boole was an English mathemetician, who, around the time Rudolph Diesel was in Kimbies, developed logic operators that could receive two statements, true or false, and output a third statement, true or false. The simplest was an "and" gate, which said, "If a is true and b is true, then c (the output) is also true. If either a or b or both a and b are false, the output is false."
布尔没有想到，他一个多世纪前开发的系统会成为电子设计师的衣食父母。因此，今天的高级数学可能是一个世纪后设计师的衣食父母。事情就是这样。但后来巴丁博士（普林斯顿大学，1936 年获得博士学位 [抱歉，麻省理工学院]）发现了半导体。我在伦敦科学博物馆的微处理器展览上看到了他的实验室笔记。它们和我在 RCM 单元中的笔记一样杂乱无章，但它们为他赢得了诺贝尔奖。
Boole had no idea that the system he developed over a century ago would become the bread and butter of electronics designers. And so the advanced mathematics of today may be the bread and butter of whatever designers a century from now. And so it recurs. But then Dr. Bardeen (Princeton, Ph.D. 1936 [sorry, MIT]) discovered the semiconductor. I'd seen his lab notes on display at the microprocessor exhibit at the Science Museum in London. They were fully as messy as my notes in the RCM cell, but they won him a Nobel Prize.
半导体是晶体管的核心。我第一次接触晶体管是七岁时我外公送给我的晶体管收音机；打开收音机时，黑色塑料外壳散发着一股气味，我问父亲，为什么制造商 Lloyd 有两个 1。
The semiconductor is the heart of a transistor. My first association with transistors was with the transistor radio my mother's father gave me when I was seven; its black plastic-smelling case came out of the box and I asked my father why Lloyd, the manufacturer, had two 1's.
晶体管就像电灯开关。打开电灯开关会接通电路，让电流流向灯。晶体管的功能与此相同，只不过晶体管不是将手指放在开关上，而是将一小点电流像手指一样放在开关上，当电流流向晶体管时，晶体管就会打开。但与电灯开关不同，无论你多么灵巧，每秒也只能打开和关闭三到四次，而晶体管每秒可以打开和关闭一百万次。我在暑期电子课上勉强学到了这么多知识，尽管那个混蛋给了我一个 C。
A transistor is like a light switch. Turning on a light switch completes a circuit and lets electricity go to the light. A transistor does the same thing, only instead of putting your finger on a switch, a teensy tinesy bit of electricity is like your finger, and it switches the transistor on when it goes to the transistor. But unlike a light switch, where, no matter how dextrous you are, you can only turn it on and off three or four times per second, you can turn a transistor on and off about a million times per second. That much I'd managed to pick up in my summer electronics class, even though the jerk gave me a C.
如果你能打开和关闭，你就能说是和否，如果你将是定义为开，将否定义为关，或者将否定义为开，将是定义为关。如果你能足够快地说是和否，并且巧妙地将逻辑联系起来，你就能创造出一台具有“智能”的机器。
If you can turn on and off, you can say yes and no, if you define yes as on and no as off or no as on and yes as off. And if you say yes and no fast enough and are clever in the logic you link, you can create a machine with "intelligence."
特罗克塞尔在讲座的前半个小时就讲完了布尔代数（一些学校会用整个学期讲授这门课），这时，一位披萨送货员打开了演讲厅的门。“给约翰·多伊先生送披萨。”那人说。
Troxel blasted through all of Boolean algebra in the first halfhour of the lecture (lesser schools spend entire semesters on this subject), at which point a pizza delivery person opened the door to the lecture hall. "Pizza for a Mr. John Doe," the guy said.
特罗克塞尔突然停下了几千分之一秒，在他的万亿分之一秒的世界里，这已经是很长的时间了。笑声渐渐平息，最上面一排的孩子付了钱给送货员后，特罗克塞尔说：“这可以教会我们如何在午餐时间安排讲座。”
Troxel stopped dead in his tracks for a few thousandths of a second, a long time in his world of trillionths, and said after the laughter died down and the kid in the top row paid the deliverer, "That'll teach us to schedule lectures during lunchtime."
讲座结束时，他概述了课程内容。“你会发现，在逻辑设计中，就像在任何设计中一样，有不止一种方式来陈述逻辑关系；也就是说，有同义词。这些同义词的含义有细微的差别，就像英语一样。英语表达力强但不准确，这就是律师能赚这么多钱的原因。使用最接近你想说的逻辑将有助于你现在与实验室伙伴沟通，以及将来与自己沟通。”
He ended the lecture with an overview of the course. "You'll find that in logic design, as in any design, there's more than one way to state a logical relation; i.e., there are synonyms. These synonyms have subtle differences in meaning, as in English. English is expressive but not exact, which is why lawyers make so much money. Using the logic that says closest to what you want to say will help you communicate with your lab partner now and with yourself later."
这话听起来很耳熟。西伯特在夏天就说过这句话。我怀疑这个部门里是否存在某种阴谋。
That sounded familiar. Siebert had said that in the summer. I wondered whether there were some kind of conspiracy in the department.
“但这不是法学院，也不是医学院。我们不会让你记住某些芯片的功能。你可以像硅谷的每个数字设计师一样，在 TTL 数据手册中查找。芯片中已经包含了很多东西，你必须通过查看数据手册来发现要使用哪种芯片。随着你的学习，你将获得经验并培养对什么会起作用的直觉。你将开发出自己的技巧书，我会在讲座中向其中添加一些我自己的技巧。
"But this isn't law school, and it isn't medical school. We won't have you memorizing what certain chips do. You can look that up in the TTL Data Book, the way every digital designer in Silicon Valley does. A lot has been put into chips already, and you'll have to discover what chip to use by looking through the data book. And as you go along, you'll gain experience and develop intuition about what's going to work. You'll develop your personal Book of Tricks, to which I'll add a few of my own during the lectures.
“我强烈建议您尽快完成前三个实验，这样您就有时间完成第四个实验，如果您的设计不是次优的，它将占用您的整个工具包。第四个实验的次优设计根本无法安装在您的电路板上。
"And I strongly encourage you to work through the first three labs as quickly as possible, so that you will have time to complete lab four, which will take up your entire nerd kit, if your design is not suboptimal. Significantly suboptimal designs for lab four simply won't fit on your circuit boards.
“然后，当然还有项目。你现在应该开始考虑实验室伙伴了；团队的最大规模是三人，两个人可能是理想的。超过三个人，它就变成了一个管理项目，而不是一个工程项目。不过，要谨慎选择你的伙伴。
"And then, of course, there is The Project. You should start thinking about a lab partner now; the maximum group size is three, and two is probably ideal. More than three and it becomes a management project, not an engineering project. Choose your partner carefully, though.
“我鼓励你好好学习这门课程，做好这个项目。如果我只根据这门课程来做招聘决定，如果你的成绩是 A，我会立即聘用你，而无需面试。如果你的成绩是 B，我会面试你，并询问你关于 6111 项目的情况。如果你的成绩是 C，你就进不了门。祝你好运。”
"I encourage you to do well in this class and on the project. If I were to make a hiring decision based only on this course, I'd hire you immediately without an interview if your grade is an A. If you had a B, I'd interview you and ask you about your six one eleven project. And if you had a C you wouldn't get in the door. Good luck."
我认为这是一门很好的课程，适合旁听，而不是为了拿分。我不需要更多的 C 了。
This is a good course just to audit, rather than to take for a grade, I thought. I don't need any more C's.
章节
C H A P T E R
18
18
结果
Results
11……现实生活中的大多数问题都是为了杀人……
11 . . . most real-life problems are for killing people . . . ...
-麻省理工学院走廊里听到的匿名评论
-Anonymous comment overheard in MIT corridor
10 月 20 日
October 20
与此同时，回到发动机实验室……
Meanwhile, back in the engine lab ...
“胶卷已装好，”我说道。
"Film loaded," I said.
“检查一下，”我的实验室搭档斯科特说。
"Check," Scott my lab partner said.
“相机已对焦。”
"Camera focused."
“查看。”
"Check."
“燃油喷射器已启动。”
"Fuel injector armed."
“查看。”
"Check."
“计算机数据采集系统已启动。”
"Computer data acquisition system initiated."
“查看。”
"Check."
“示波器已启动。”
"Oscilloscope initiated."
“查看。”
"Check."
“实验室灯灭了。”
"Lab lights out."
“查看。”
"Check."
“打开手电筒。”
"Flashlight on."
“查看。”
"Check."
“提高油箱压力。”
"Raise tank pressure."
“50psi，60…70…80…90…”
"Fifty psi, 60 ... 70 ... 80 ... 90 ..."
牢房门突然打开了，让我措手不及，吓了我一跳。“那人是谁？你没看到我们在做测试吗？”我咆哮道。
The cell door opened unexpectedly, suddenly, caught me off guard, made me jump. "Who the hell is that? Can't you see we're doing a test?" I barked.
是尼克。
It was Nick.
“呃，妈妈，呃，船长，”他被我的爆发吓了一跳，说道。他看起来很伤心，好像失去了一位朋友。他看起来就像我两年前在吉夫托普洛斯的办公室里哭出来之前的样子。但他没有说出来；在麻省理工学院的二十年让他变得坚强。“实验室门上没有任何标志，所以我想我应该去看看你的情况。如果我搞砸了实验，我很抱歉。”
"Uh, g'momin', uh, Cap'n," he said, taken aback at my outburst. He looked hurt, as if he'd lost a friend. He looked the way I must have just before I broke into tears in Gyftopoulos's office two years before. But he held it at that; twenty years at MIT had toughened him. "There wasn't any sign on the lab door'n all so I figured I'd sotta check in on you an' see how you were doin'. Sorry if I messed up the experiment."
我还没说完。“好吧，该死的，尼克，下次你敲门好吗？现在我们得从头再来。此外，如果你在摄像机运行时打开门，你就会毁了测试。”
I wasn't through. "Well, dammit, Nick, next time knock, will you? Now we have to start all over. Besides, if you'd opened the door when the camera was running you would have ruined a test."
尼克的表情更加阴沉了。“抱歉，船长。”
Nick's expression sank further. "Sorry, Cap'n."
这个机构对我的虐待、对我自尊的伤害，就像油箱里的压力不断积累一样；它需要发泄，而尼克就是最近的受害者。
The abuse the institute had dealt me, the damage it had done to my self-esteem, had piled up like the pressure in the tank; it needed to be vented, and Nick was the nearest victim.
斯科特打开阀门，放掉罐内的空气。“没什么大不了的，”他一边说，一边试图把事情处理好。“一切都准备就绪。我们可以重新开始程序。我们今天会完成所有需要做的测试。”
Scott opened the valve and dumped the air from the tank. "It's no big deal," he said, trying to patch things up. "Everything's armed. We can just start the sequence again. We'll finish all the tests we need to do today."
“哎呀，尼克，对不起，”我说，“我刚才有点失神了。”
"Gee, Nick, I'm sorry," I said. "I just kind of lost it there for a minute."
“没关系，船长。我见过很多学生都遇到过这种情况。就像一位教授曾经对我说过的一样。他们给你加热，让你变得坚强，就像他们对钢铁所做的那样。”
" 'S all right, Cap'n. I've seen it happen to a lotta students here. It's like one of the professors said to me once. They put the heat on you to harden you, just like they do to steel."
所以现在我成了这个地方的产物，我心想。更敏捷、更聪明、傲慢、没有耐心、有主见、不人道。我必须离开这里。但如果我对尼克（他已经习惯了这些人）是个强硬、傲慢的混蛋，那么对其他人来说我又会是谁呢？我希望我能永远留在这里。
So now I'm a product of this place, I wondered. Quicker, smarter, arrogant, impatient, directed, inhumane. I've got to get out of here. But if I'm a tough, arrogant jerk to Nick, who's used to these people, who will I be to the rest of the world? I wish I could stay here forever.
“在一间闲置的牢房里有一块牌子，船长。我去给你拿来，”尼克说，然后他拿回来一块带框的白色牌子，就像牢房门上的牌子一样，上面写着“测试正在进行中；请勿打扰。”
"There's a sign down in one of the idle cells, Cap'n. I'll go bring it for you," Nick said, and he returned with a framed white sign, like the one on the door of the cell, that said, "Test in progress; do not disturb."
“谢谢，尼克，”我说。
"Thanks, Nick," I said.
切特绕过角落走进了牢房。
Chet rounded the comer into the cell.
“那么你们怎么样了？”他问道。
"So how you guys doing?" he asked.
我回答说：“好的。我们即将进行一系列测试。我们今天计划测试涡流箱和无涡流箱。”涡流意味着空气在发动机中旋转，就像一个漩涡。这应该能使柴油与空气更好地混合，从而燃烧得更好。无涡流意味着没有。
I answered, "OK. We're about to do a series of tests. We're aiming to do the swirl case and the no swirl case today." Swirl means the air is spinning in the engine, like a whirlpool. That's supposed to mix the diesel fuel with the air better so it bums better. No swirl means it's not.
切特说：“好吧，如果你能让这两个案例奏效，你最好继续下去。你知道，当一个有这么多部件的实验同时成功时，你必须保持势头，否则就会出现问题。我的很多朋友花了三年时间做实验，只用一天时间做测试。我会在旁边当啦啦队长。我们还应该改变空气温度，看看这会如何影响点火延迟。如果你得到五个温度，你可以画一个图表，这将是你的论文。”
Chet said, "Well, if you get those two cases to work, you'd better keep going. You know when an experiment with this many pieces works all at once you gotta keep the momentum before something breaks. A lotta my friends spent three years building their experiments and one day doing the tests. I'll hang around and be a cheerleader. We also oughta vary the air temperature and see how that affects the ignition delay. If you get five temperatures, you can make a graph and that will be your thesis."
隧道尽头的光不再是另一边驶来的火车。我今天就可以拿到数据。一些漂亮的电影会让预选赛的评论教授们惊叹不已，还有一些电影分析。麻省理工学院的硕士学位。我记得西弗吉尼亚大学的那个家伙说起去年夏天在那里的那个拥有麻省理工学院硕士学位的人，他有多聪明。当然，现在我的眼界更高了，麻省理工学院、博士学位、金钱是我一生的待办事项清单。每当你接近一个里程碑时，你就会展望下一个里程碑。
The light at the end of the tunnel wasn't a train coming the other way anymore. I could have the data today. Some pretty movies to wow the reviewing professors at the qualifiers, some analysis of the films. Master's from MIT. I remembered the sound of it from the guy at West Virginia U talking about the guy who'd been there the summer before who had a master's from MIT and how smart he was. Of course, now my sights were higher, and M-I-T, P-H-D, M-O-N-E-Y was on my lifetime to-do list. Whenever you near a milestone you look ahead to the next one.
在我的微型太空计划中，所有系统都已启动。现在，喷射器每次喷射的燃料量都一致。（我已经想出了如何使用联合技术公司技术员乔治给我的废品来修改内部结构。）现在，它的球形喷嘴已经朝着正确的方向。乔治的车间第一次没有正确读懂我的图纸，所以我拿了一个高尔夫球，把它像一个巨大的喷嘴一样标记出来，然后把它给机械师看，以确保他第二次知道我在说什么。
All systems were go in my miniature version of the space program. The injector now spurted consistent amounts of fuel on every injection. (I'd figured out how to modify the insides using the pieces of junk that George the technician at United Technologies had given me.) Its spherical nozzle went in the right direction now. George's shop didn't read my drawing right the first time, so I'd taken a golf ball out there and marked it up like a giant nozzle and shown it to the machinist to make sure he knew what I was talking about the second time.
我们还测试了我设计的透明窗口，我们知道它能承受燃烧的压力。这就是我设计的机器。
And we'd tested the clear window I'd designed, and we knew it would withstand the pressure of the combustion. That was my end of the machine.
斯科特已经完成了新的启动装置，实验顺序电子设备也已设置好，确保一切在正确的时间发生。我们知道影片需要多长时间才能达到每秒 3,000 帧的观看速度。我们知道活塞需要多长时间才能从机器的一端移动到另一端 18 英寸。我们知道启动装置和燃油喷射器的机械延迟时间。有了所有这些数据，我们绘制了一张地图，即实验的顺序，就像编舞师会设计舞蹈，作曲家会编排乐谱一样。
For his part, Scott had finished the new starting mechanism, and the electronics to sequence the experiment were set to make everything happen at the right time. We knew just how long the film would take to reach a viewing rate of 3,000 frames per second. We knew just how long the piston would take to travel the 18 inches from one end of the machine to the other. We knew the mechanical delay times in the starting mechanism and the fuel injector. With all this data, we'd constructed a map, a sequence of the experiment, much as a choreographer would block out a dance, or a composer would arrange a score.
我们在黑色的电子计时盒中设置了适当的延迟时间，精确到千分之一秒。上帝保佑，延迟时间可以重复，胶片可以捕捉到燃烧过程，计算机可以捕捉到压力数据，而我也可以找到一些灵感来讲述这一切。
We'd dialed in the appropriate delays, all thousandths of seconds, in the little black electronic timing boxes. God willing, the delays would be repeatable, the film would catch the combustion, the computer would catch the pressure data, and I would find something inspired to say about it all.
“实验室的灯关掉，”我说。
"Lab lights off," I said.
“检查一下，”斯科特说。
"Check," Scott said.
“打开手电筒。”
"Flashlight on."
“查看。”
"Check."
“提高罐压：50 psi...60...70...80...90。
"Raise tank pressure: 50 psi ... 60 ... 70 ... 80 ... 90. .
机器吱吱作响，并发出 90 psi 的砰砰声，但我知道它在什么压力下会发出这种声音，所以我的脉搏率每 psi 的压力每分钟只增加半次，而之前启动时为两次。
The machine creaked and made the 90-psi thunk, but I knew at what pressure it would make each noise so my pulse rate only increased half a beat per minute for each psi of pressure, down from two beats during the earlier firings.
我继续给气瓶放气。“100……110……115、116、117、118、119、120，保持稳定，”我说道。
I continued to let the air in the tank. "100... 110... 115, 116, 117, 118, 119, 120 and steady," I said.
吱吱声停止了。机器在高应力状态下处于平衡状态。
The creaking stopped. The machine was at equilibrium at its high state of stress.
“查看。”
"Check."
“说一点祈祷吧。”
"Say a little prayer."
暂停。沉默。
Pause. Silence.
“查看。”
"Check."
“火！”
"Fire!"
ZZZZZZIIINNNNGGGGG。胶片滚动。咔嗒。轴释放。轰。闪光。点火。我们点火了，休斯顿。
ZZZZZZIIINNNNGGGGG. The film rolled. Click. The shaft released. Boom. Flash. Ignition. We have ignition, Houston.
一切都在一瞬间完成。“好的，打开灯，”切特说。“记下油箱压力表和燃油喷射器上的读数。你以后可能会需要这些信息。你可能不会用到，但如果你不记下来，这些信息就会永远丢失。我认为我们的测试很成功。我认为今天会是一次很好的测试。”
All in half a heartbeat. "Okay, turn the lights on," Chet said. "Write down the readings on the pressure gauge in the tank and on the fuel injector. You might need that information later. You probably won't, but if you don't write it down it's lost forever. I think we got a good test. I think it's going to be a good test day."
我在实验室笔记本上记录了压力，并将压力转移到储罐中。我们打开门，尼克站在外面。
I recorded the pressures in the lab notebook and dumped the pressure to the tank. We opened the door and Nick was standing outside.
“听起来不错，船长。一切听起来都很顺利。是的，我敢打赌，这会让建筑物再增加千分之一英寸左右。我们最好留意墙上的裂缝。”
"Sounded like a good one, Cap'n. Everything sounded just right. Yep, I bet that one took the building another thousandth of an inch apaht or so. We better keep an eye on that crack in the wall."
“谢谢，尼克。再读五年我就能拿到硕士学位了。”
"Thanks, Nick. Five more to go and I'll have a master's degree."
咝咝。咔嚓。砰。我们重复了五次这个序列，有漩涡、没有漩涡，气温也不同。电脑每次都成功。闪光灯每次都成功。但胶片每次都成功吗？
Zing. Click. Boom. We repeated the sequence five times, with swirl, without swirl, with different air temperatures. The computer worked every time. The flash worked every time. But did the film work every time?
我把未冲洗的胶卷装进背包，骑车穿过哈佛大桥（麻省理工学院旁边横跨查尔斯河的桥），从哈佛大桥沿着联邦大道经过不断升值的公寓楼，到达南区的胶卷冲洗实验室。
I loaded the undeveloped film in my backpack and cycled across the Harvard Bridge (the bridge next to MIT spanning the Charles), from the Harvard Bridge down Commonwealth Avenue past the exponentially appreciating condominiums and on to the film developing lab in the South End.
仿佛就在昨天，去年春天，我走过同样的路线，燃油喷射的薄膜进入空气中。当时粉红色的木兰花盛开，它们的香味甚至盖过了我前面柴油巴士的尾气。
It seemed like yesterday, last spring when I'd done the same route with the film of the fuel injection into air. The pink magnolia flowers were blooming then, their fragrance overpowering even the diesel bus fumes ahead of me.
现在树叶开始变色，我闻到的只有柴油机尾气的味道。但如果测试成功，我很快就会看到尾气在形成的几毫秒内形成的过程。我会看到鲁道夫·狄塞尔只能想象的事情。如果我能看到尾气，也许我能从中找到一种模式、一种洞察力、一种看待它的新方式，也许，只是也许，它会在未来几代柴油发动机中找到它的用武之地。在技术的埃菲尔铁塔上，我将成为一颗铆钉。
Now the leaves were changing and I smelled only the diesel exhaust. But if the test were successful, I would soon see that exhaust in its formative milliseconds. I would see what Rudolph Diesel could only imagine. If I could see the exhaust, perhaps I could find a pattern in it, an insight, a new way of looking at it that would maybe, just maybe, find its way into future generations of diesel engines. In the Eiffel tower of technology, I would be a rivet.
10 月 22 日
October 22
大部分卡洛里克斯的学生都毕业了，但高级宿舍有一支校内足球队，参加的是 B 级联赛，比 C 级联赛高一级。队里每个人都是瘦骨嶙峋的十九岁少年，但我今年二十六岁，比以前聪明多了。
Most of the Calorics had graduated, but Senior House had an intramural soccer team in B-league, one notch above C-league. Everyone on the team was a skinny nineteen-year-old, but at twenty-six I was wiser.
“来吧，你这个老胖子，”他们说道。“快跑，快走。”
"Come on, you fat old man," they said. "Run. Move."
我踢得聪明。我在正确的时间出现在了左翼的正确位置，当我将球射向球门时，守门员措手不及。我进了一球。
I played smart. I was at the right place at the right time at left wing and the goalie was flatfooted when I rocketed the shot to the back of the net. Score one for me.
比赛结束后，高年级宿舍的工作人员穿过校园回到沃克食堂，我则独自去离实验室更近的洛布德尔吃饭。我越来越习惯一个人吃饭。一年级的朋友都走了，我也懒得去结交新朋友了。现在最重要的是论文，然后是博士资格考试。
After the game the Senior House crew returned across campus to Walker dining hall and I went to eat in Lobdell, closer to the lab, by myself. More and more I ate by myself. Friends from the first year were gone and I'd slackened in my efforts to make new friends. All that mattered now was the thesis, and after that the doctoral qualifying exams.
辛迪·布鲁克斯坐在我的桌旁。聊了几分钟后，她说：“你有点孤僻，不是吗？”
Cindy Brooks sat at my table. After a few minutes of conversation, she said, "You're kind of a loner, aren't you?"
10 月 25 日
October 25
就业办公室在 12 号楼，与无尽走廊在同一层。这样招聘人员更容易找到这个地方。我报名了，想和石油勘探公司斯伦贝谢的人谈谈。
The placement office is in Building 12, on the same level as the infinite corridor. It makes it easier for the recruiters to find the place. I'd signed up to talk to the people from Schlumberger, the oil exploration company.
我对勘探石油没有兴趣；从内心深处来说，我更愿意探索工业工厂，以寻找降低石油需求的方法。但这些人第一年的收入约为 5 万美元（1983 年），外加奖金，而且他们的税款并不高，因为他们在马来西亚和印度尼西亚等海外国家工作。三年后，你可以用现金买房，然后做你想做的事。麻省理工学院的硕士学位可以让你胜任这种工作。
I had no interest in exploring for oil; in my heart of hearts I would prefer to explore industrial plants for ways to lower the need for oil. But these guys made about fifty thousand 1983 dollars in their first year, plus bonuses, and their taxes weren't as high because they worked overseas in places like Malaysia and Indonesia. In three years you can buy a house for cash and then do what you want. A master's from MIT qualifies you for this kind of job.
就业办公室有天窗，摆放着几张公司宣传册的桌子，宣传册上的照片大多是穿着衬衫和领带的男士，以及穿着实验室夹克的女士，还有“在 Data General 拓展你的视野”和“让你的职业生涯与杜邦一起成长”等标题。
The placement office was skylit, had several tables with corporate brochures with pictures of mostly men in shirtsleeves and ties and women wearing lab jackets, and headings like "Expand your horizons at Data General" and "Let your career grow with Du Pont."
这一天，除了正常的面试之外，大二的六年级学生（六年级专业；一种带薪实习）还要参加带薪实习职位的面试。这些电气工程师将在本科期间的一部分时间在工业界工作，支付教育费用，提供廉价的熟练劳动力，并在毕业前获得“现实世界”的经验。六年级学生都穿着同样的深蓝色西装、白衬衫、红领带和黑色鞋子和袜子；我不知道面试官如何区分他们。
This day, in addition to the normal interviews, the sophomore Six-a's (Course Six majors; a means co-op) were interviewing for their co-op positions. These electrical engineers would spend part of their undergraduate years working in industry, defray the cost of their education, provide cheap skilled labor, and obtain "realworld" experience before graduation. The Six-a's all wore the same dark blue suit, white shirt, red tie, and black shoes and socks; I wondered how the interviewers could tell them apart.
当我签到参加面试时，身着浅蓝色西装的 Theunissen 先生从面试隔间后面走出来，伸出手。“怀特先生？”他问道。
I signed in for the interview as Mr. Theunissen, in a light blue suit, walked out of the back area of interview cubicles and put his hand out. "Mr. White?" he said.
“是的。”我回答道，并坚定地握了握他的手，正如就业办公室面试指南中所建议的那样。
"Yes," I said and shook his hand firmly, as recommended in the placement office guide to interviewing.
“很高兴见到你。请这边走。”他领着我穿过狭长的走廊，走廊两边都是面试隔间，隔间有门，可以保护隐私。不过，墙不是很厚，所以我们在经过他的房间时可以听到面试的零碎信息。“你昨晚为什么没去参加关于公司的幻灯片演示？”他问道。“必须出席。”
"It's a pleasure to meet you. Please come this way." He led me back through the long narrow corridor with the little interview compartments on each side, with doors for privacy. The walls weren't very thick, though, so we could pick up bits and pieces of the interviews as we passed to his space. "Why weren't you at the slide presentation about the company last night?" he asked. "Attendance was mandatory."
什么幻灯片演示？他想让我措手不及。但他不是 Chet Yeung。他也不是 Heywood 或 Gyftopoulos。
What slide presentation? He's trying to catch me off guard. He's no Chet Yeung, though. Nor is he a Heywood or a Gyftopoulos.
“我今天早上有考试，我真的需要好好复习一下，”我回答道。“你有录像带或者其他可以借给我的东西吗？图书馆里有录像机。”
"I had a test this morning, and I really needed to study for it," I answered. "Do you have a video or anything I can borrow? There are VCRs in the library."
他微笑着，在笔记本上做了个小记录。“不，我认为没有必要。如果你来休斯顿拜访我们，你就会发现关于我们业务的所有信息。你为什么有兴趣在斯伦贝谢工作？”
He smiled, made a little note on his pad. "No, I don't think that will be necessary. If you come visit us in Houston, you'll find out all you need to know about our business. Why are you interested in working for Schlumberger?"
“我听说你们赚了很多钱，”我说。
"I hear you guys make tons of money," I said.
这次他笑得更开心了，几乎要笑出来了，然后又做了一个记录。“你知道，这是第一次有人这样回答这个问题，”他说。“你觉得我们能赚多少钱？”
He smiled more this time, almost laughed, and made another note. "You know, that's the first time anyone has ever answered that question that way," he said. "How much do you think we make?"
“哦，我不知道，也许 5 万美元左右。我想和你们一起生活几年后，我的生活就没问题了。”
"Oh, I don't know, maybe $50K or so. I figure after a few years with you guys I'd be set for life."
“是的，你说得对，第一年至少有五万，然后在公司工作的头五年内就会达到十万；然后，随着你在管理层的晋升，薪酬待遇会越来越有吸引力。”
"Yes, you're right; it's at least fifty thousand in the first year, and then within the first five years at the company it reaches up to one hundred thousand; then, as you move up in management, the compensation package becomes more and more attractive."
我笑了笑，在便笺簿上做了个小记录。
I smiled, made a little note on my pad.
他问：“这里说你会说法语。我们用法语采访你几分钟，你介意吗？”
He asked a question, "It says here you speak French. Would you mind if we conducted the interview in French for a few minutes?"
“Bien stir; et italien？”（当然，那之后说意大利语怎么样？）几分钟后，在他的记事本上做了友好的标记，我们又回到了英语。
"Bien stir; et italien?" (Sure, how about Italian after that?) After a few minutes and friendly marks on his notepad we returned to English.
“我看你在比利时的冯·卡门研究所待过一段时间。你能告诉我你在那里做了些什么吗？”
"I see you spent some time in Belgium at the von Karman Institute. Would you care to tell me a little about what you did there?"
这是面试的一部分，他们希望你展示如何传达技术概念；这在未来某天与国王、酋长或石油部长的会面中可能很重要。财团会议的演讲已经让我做好了准备。“嗯，我花了很多时间处理气流速度测量技术，例如热线风速仪。”说一两句大话不会有什么坏处。他可能从来没有听说过热线风速仪。
This is the part of the interview where they want you to show how you can communicate technical concepts; it might be important in a meeting with a king or a sheik or an oil minister someday in the future. The consortium meeting presentations had prepped me for this. "Well, I spent a lot of time dealing with air flow speed measurement techniques such as hot wire anemometry." A big word or two couldn't hurt. He'd probably never heard of hot wire anemometry anyway.
“这很有趣，”他说。“事实上，我在巴黎高等技术学院的论文就是探讨热线风速仪的电子局限性。”
"That's very interesting," he said. "In fact, my thesis at the Ecole Technique Superieure in Paris involved exploring the electronic limitations of hot wire anemometry."
哎呀。我违反了面试第一条规则。永远不要抛出一个你无法提供完整解释的流行语，即其专业知识树的衍生词。我希望他们把这个写进面试手册，而不是关于领带颜色的提示。
Uh-oh. I'd broken interview rule number one. Never throw out a buzzword that you can't back up with a full explanation, a derivation of its tree of specialized knowledge. I wished they'd put that in the interview handbook instead of tips on tie colors.
我两年半前就这么做了。那时我还没有学会内化事物的深层结构，正忙着享受我在布鲁塞尔为期一年的带薪假期。“呃。这与冷却电线的气流有关。随着细短的电线冷却，其电阻会减小。电线处于电路中，电阻的减小或增加有点像电路的输入。它会改变电路的输出，这就是你知道气流速度的方式。”我想，这应该可以了。一般性的讨论对于工作面试来说就足够了，不是吗？这不是博士资格考试。
It was two and a half years ago I did that. It was before I'd learned about internalizing the deep structures of things, and I was busy enjoying my year-long paid vacation in Brussels. "Uh. It has to do with the air flow cooling off a wire. As the fine short length of wire cools, its resistance decreases. The wire is in an electrical circuit, and the decrease or increase in electrical resistance is sort of like an input to the circuit. It changes the output to the circuit, and that's how you know how fast the flow is going." That should do it, I thought. A general discussion is sufficient for a job interview, isn't it? This isn't a doctoral qualifying exam.
他想要更多。“你介意画出适合安装风速计的电路图吗？”
He wanted more. "Would you mind sketching the circuit that the anemometer would fit into?"
“嗯，哎呀，已经有一段时间了，呃...”
"Well, gee, it's been a while and, uh ..."
“如果你愿意的话，你可以花几分钟。我就读一下报纸。”他说道，并从公文包中取出一份《费加罗报》。
"You can take a couple of minutes if you'd like. I'll just read my newspaper," he said, removing his copy of Le Figaro from his briefcase.
我努力回忆暑期电子课上关于惠斯通电桥测量电路工作原理的解释。当时我大概理解了 80%，刚好够及格。不过，他坐在纸后面，偶尔翻动纸张，让我有点难以集中注意力。
I tried to remember the explanation from my summer electronics class of how a Wheatstone bridge measurement circuit worked. I'd understood about 80 percent of it then, just enough to pass the class. It was a little hard to concentrate, though, with him behind the paper, occasionally flipping the page.
“这是我目前能做的最好的了，”我最后说道。我向他展示了我的草图并简要解释了一下。“因此，当这个支路的电阻发生变化时，电路中的这两点之间就会产生电压差，这就是你在示波器上看到的；我记得有一个技巧可以设置电路方程来求解电压，但我现在想不起来。也许我今晚可以把它寄给你。”
"This is the best I can do for now," I said finally. I showed and briefly explained my sketch. "And so as the resistance changes in this leg, it makes a voltage difference between these two points in the circuit and that's what you see on the oscilloscope; I remember there's a trick to setting up the equations for the circuit to solve for the voltage, but I can't remember that right now. Maybe I could mail it to you this evening."
“那没必要。我想现在就够了。我们希望你尽快拿一份申请表寄给我们。我会把它给其他招聘人员看，我们可能会邀请你来休斯顿进行进一步的面试，”他说。
"That won't be necessary. I think that's enough for now. We would like you to take an application form and send it in to us as soon as you can. I'll show it to some of the other recruiters and we may invite you to Houston for some further interviews," he said.
我想我通过了。
I think I passed.
那天晚上，在我的办公室里。当我扫描第一次燃烧测试的高速影片时，台式电影查看器发出呼呼呼的声音。数百帧画面一片漆黑、一片漆黑、一片漆黑。我原本以为大部分画面都是一片漆黑：在大部分测试过程中，摄像机都需要加速；这就是为什么它是第一个被打开的东西。
That night, in my office. Whirrwhirrwhirrwhirrr went the desktop film viewer as I scanned the high-speed movie of the first combustion test. It was blackness, blackness, blackness for hundreds of frames. I was expecting mostly darkness: the camera needed to accelerate for most of the test; that's why it was the first thing to be turned on.
第 800 帧显示了一个图像。我放慢了电影观看器的速度。801 更亮，802 更亮，803 更亮，每帧间隔三千分之一秒。我在牛顿的二手相机店找到的三个闪光开始照亮燃烧窗。804、805、806、807 都亮到最大，但气缸内什么也没发生。我希望我们捕捉到了燃料的喷射。我希望我们对所有延迟的同步是正确的。
Frame 800 showed an image. I slowed the film viewer. 801 was brighter, 802 brighter still, 803 brighter still, each frame a three-thousandth of a second. The three flashes that I'd found at the used camera store in Newton started to light the combustion window. 804, 805, 806, 807 were at full brightness, but nothing was happening in the cylinder. I hoped we caught the injection of the fuel. I hoped our synchronization of all the delays was correct.
810、811，柴油出现在喷嘴尖端，一组液体星形喷射流从中心呈放射状散发出来。休斯顿，我们有喷射。812、813，喷射流穿过气缸。再过十四帧，燃料继续流入燃烧室的热空气中。加油，大个子，你可以做到的。燃料喷射流在几帧中变得更厚。828、829 然后恢复到前十四帧的正常流动，然后另一帧的厚度脉冲。随着柱塞压缩液体，液体流出，柱塞再次压缩，液体再次流出，喷油器内部的小零件上下弹跳。
810, 811, the diesel fuel appeared at the nozzle tip, a liquid starfish-shaped set of jets radially emanating from the center. We have injection, Houston. 812, 813, the jets traversed the cylinder. Fourteen more frames, fuel kept flowing into the hot air in the combustion chamber. Come on, big guy, you can do it. The fuel jets became thicker for a couple of frames. 828, 829 then returned to the regular flow of the previous fourteen frames, then another pulse of thickness for a frame. The little parts inside the injector were bouncing up and down as the plunger compressed the liquid and the liquid went out and the plunger compressed it again and the liquid went out again.
走吧伙计，燃烧吧。
Let's go, guy. Burn.
帧 831。我们点火了，休斯顿。圆柱体边缘开始出现小橙色光点，然后像着火的房子一样，橙色变成了亮黄色，然后几乎变成了白色，因为火焰从外向内吞噬了喷射器——就像一只明亮的燃烧的海星。
Frame 831. We have ignition, Houston. Little orange lights started at the edge of the cylinder, and then like a house afire the orangeness became bright yellow, then almost white as the flame engulfed the jets from the outside in-a bright flaming starfish.
请参考图 1。请看下一张幻灯片。
Please refer to Figure 1. Next slide, please.
海星燃烧着，燃烧着，燃烧着，直到……第 839 帧，我们可以看到，烟灰颗粒在火焰周围形成……海星现在不复存在，只是原始星系形成、发光和黑暗的发光余烬，发出海星生命的最后一丝气息，喘息着，发光余烬逐渐消退，逐渐消失在逐渐消退的黑暗中……这是无涡流的情况。由于燃料在燃烧前蒸发的较少，并且在空气匮乏的环境中，更多的燃料被有效地烘烤而不是燃烧，因此形成了残留的烟灰。
The starfish flamed and burned and flamed until ... frame 839, as we can see, the soot particles are forming around the outside of the flame and ... the starfish is no longer there now, just a glowing ember of primordial galaxies forming and glowing and darkness yielding the last breath of the starfish's life gasping, glowing embers fading fading back into fading darkness ... this is the no swirl case. There is residual soot formation as less of the fuel vaporizes prior to combustion and more of the fuel is effectively baked, not burned, in an air-starved environment.
请看下一张幻灯片。涡流箱。
Next slide, please. The swirl case.
海星燃烧后消失了，没有残留的余烬。这是我在论文中要报告的结果。其他涡流箱在不同空气温度下的情况也类似。现在来看看压力数据。我查看了计算机生成的图表。气缸压力上升，在活塞到达行程末端并锁定到位时保持相当稳定，然后图表再次急剧上升。
The starfish burned and disappeared, without the lingering, burning embers. A result to report in my thesis. Similarly for the other swirl cases at different air temperatures. Now to look at the pressure data. I looked at the computer-generated graphs. The cylinder pressure rose, stayed fairly constant as the piston reached the end of its travel and was locked in place, and then the graph steeply shot up again.
所有的图表看起来都一样，并排摆放。
All the graphs looked the same, sitting side by side.
该怎么办？三天后就是联盟会议。我盯着它们看，想找出一个模式。一定有模式。论文的第一个定义是提出并由论证维持的命题。如果没有命题，就没有论文。如果没有论文，至少就没有硕士学位，当然就没有博士学位。这些由计算机打印机生成的窄线一定有更多要说的。该怎么办？
What to do? The consortium meeting is in three days. I stared at them all, looking for a pattern. There has to be a pattern. The first definition of thesis is a proposition advanced and maintained by argument. If there is no proposition there is no thesis. If there is no thesis there is at least no master's degree, and certainly no Ph.D. There must be something more to say about these narrow lines generated by a computer printer. What to do?
在透明胶片上描摹它们。
Trace them on transparencies.
好的，我会在透明塑料上描出它们。现在怎么办？
Okay, I'll trace them on clear plastic. Now what?
用小箭头标记注射开始的位置。
Mark where the injection starts with a little arrow.
很简单。还有什么？
Easy enough. What else?
将透明胶片一张叠一张地堆叠起来，然后滑动它们直到燃烧开始的陡峭部分排列在同一位置。
Pile the transparencies one on top of the other, and slide them around until the steep part of the start of combustion lines up at the same place.
那平静、细小的声音并不在火中。
The still, small voice was not in the fire.
超过 19,000 小时。我们有论文，休斯顿。我们有论文。任务控制中心鼓掌欢呼，工程师们互相拥抱、握手、拍背，抬头看着大屏幕电视，不止一双眼睛里噙满了泪水。鹰号已经着陆。
Tplus 19,000 hours. We have thesis, Houston. We have thesis. Mission Control clapped and cheered and the engineers hugged one another and shook one anothers' hands and patted one another on the back and looked up at the large-screen television and tears welled up in more than one pair of eyes. The Eagle has landed.
喷射开始和燃烧开始之间的时间（即点火延迟时间）越长，曲线图的陡峭部分持续的时间就越长。当然，如果你仔细想想，这一点是显而易见的，因为点火延迟时间越长，混合的易燃物质就越多。易燃物质越多意味着燃烧将发生得更快，并且压力将上升得更快，因为火焰几乎同时吞噬了更易燃的物质。
The longer the time between the start of injection and the start of combustion (a.k.a. the ignition delay time), the longer the steep part of the graph lasts. This, of course, is obvious if you think about it, because the longer the ignition delay time is, the more stuff is mixed to easy burnability. More stuff's being easily burnable means the burning will happen faster, and the pressure will rise faster as the flames engulf the more easily burnable stuff almost all at once.
这就是我的主张，我将能够通过进一步分析现有数据来构建论据。但有关燃烧的其他问题仍然存在。
That's the proposition, and I'll be able to construct the arguments with further analysis of the existing data. But other questions about the combustion lingered.
多少涡流才是好的涡流？我见过涡流很好地混合了燃料，但是否存在一个临界点，超过这个临界点，增加涡流对你没有任何好处？这些实验的总体意义是什么？如果我正在为公交车设计发动机，那么目的是尽量减少每英里的污染吗？如果是这样，我是否会达到这样一个临界点，即涡流冷却气缸气体会降低发动机的功率，尽管这会减少排放？也许有一定量的涡流可以完成混合，而不会通过气缸壁排放过多的燃烧热量。要找到答案，需要进行更多的实验，并更多地了解燃烧模型。硕士水平之外还需要几年的研究。Peregrine White，Jr.，理学博士。听起来不错。
How much swirl is good swirl? I've seen that swirl mixes the fuel well, but is there a point beyond which adding more swirl doesn't do you any more good? What is the global point of these experiments? If I were designing an engine for a bus, would the point be to minimize the pollution per mile? If so, would I reach a point where the cooling of the cylinder's gas from the swirl's flow decreases the power of the engine even though it reduces the emissions? Perhaps there's an amount of swirl that accomplishes the mixing without dumping too much of the combustion heat through the walls of the cylinder. To find answers will require more experiments and more understanding of combustion modeling. Another couple of years of research beyond the master's level. Peregrine White, Jr., Sc.D. It has a nice ring to it.
10 月 27 日
October 27
阿特金森。黛安娜在二楼大厅打电话。“听着，米奇，如果你想在四周内拿到那个软件，那你就得花钱。我的员工有习题集、实验室、考试和其他事情要做，你知道的。他们需要时不时地睡觉。”另一条线路亮了起来。
Atkinson. Dianne was on the phone in the second floor hall. "Look, Mitch, if you want that piece of software in four weeks, it's going to cost you. My people have problem sets and labs and exams and other stuff to do, y'know. And they need to sleep now and then." One of the other lines lit up.
“我能让你等一会儿吗？谢谢……嗨，史蒂夫。嘿，我能马上给你回电话吗？你比我们晚三个小时，对吧？我会在你们那边六点之前给你回电话。再见。”在她挂断电话之前，第三条线路亮了起来。“比尔。伙计。是的，事情正在进展中。嘿，我能十点后再给你回电话吗？谢谢。”
"Can I put you on hold for a minute? Thanks.... "Hi, Steve. Say, can I get right back to you? You're three hours behind us, right? I'll call back before six o'clock your time. Ciao." Before she hung up the third line lit up. "Bill. Buddy. Yeah, it's coming along. Say, can I call you back in ten? Thanks."
“所以，米奇，不管怎样，我的人应该可以送货，但价格会比较高，而且还要加上管理费等等……成交了吗？太好了。明天一早我会派快递员把合同送过来。”
"So, anyway, Mitch, my people should be able to deliver, but it's going to be at premium rates, and what with overhead and all. ... It's a deal? Great. I'll have a courier drop the contract by first thing in the morning."
等她挂了电话后，我说：“生意好像还不错。”
After she was off the phone, I said, "Business seems to be pretty good."
“是的，我会坚持下去。明天我要去参加一个房地产介绍研讨会。你愿意和我一起去吗？”
"Yeah, I'm hangin' in there. Say, I'm going to an introductionto-real-estate seminar tomorrow. Care to join me?"
“当然。”
"Sure."
第二天前往波士顿万豪酒店的路上：
Next day on the way to the Boston Marriott:
“那么您是怎样进入软件行业的呢？”我问道。
"So how'd you get started in the software biz?" I asked.
“嗯，我十三岁时用当保姆的钱买了一台苹果电脑，然后开始玩黑客游戏。你知道你是怎么听到这些关于音乐家的故事的吗？当他们上高中时，所有很酷的人都在商场里做兼职，他们在卧室里听唱片、背诵独奏和练习音阶？嗯，我就是这样的，只有电脑是我的工具。有时我妈妈和继父担心我花太多时间独自待在房间里，我想。
"Well, I bought an Apple with my baby-sitting money when I was thirteen and I began to hack. You know how you hear these stories about musicians and how when they're in high school and all the cool people are working part time at the mall'n stuff and they're in their bedroom listening to records and memorizing solos and doing scales? Well, I was like that, only the computer was my instrument. Sometimes my mother and stepfather worried about my spending so much time alone in my room, I think.
“所以，不管怎样，这很有趣，我开始订阅杂志，并应聘了自由职业软件人员的广告，高中时我得到了越来越多的工作。大一来到这里时，我一直与客户保持联系，为了偷懒，我把我的简历放在就业办公室的简历簿里。好吧，我谎报了我的年龄，假装我是大四学生，但他们从不检查，所以大一的时候，我飞遍全国去安排旅行——你知道，去这些公司面试——他们总是给我工作机会，但我礼貌地拒绝了，递上我的名片，说，但如果你想以合同方式完成任何工作......'我没有写 Senior House, 4 Ames St., Atkinson 202，而是写成了 4 Ames St., Mail Stop A202。一旦我证明我可以按时按预算交付，这些人甚至不在乎我住在哪里。我甚至还没有见过一半的客户联系人。一切都是通过电话和联邦快递软盘进行的磁盘邮件”。
"So, anyway, it was fun and I started subscribing to magazines and I answered an ad for a free-lance software person, and I just kept getting more work in high school. I kept up with my clients when I came here freshman year, and for a hack I put my resume in the placement office resume book. OK, I misrepresented my age and pretended I was a senior, but they never checked so freshman year I was flying around the country to plant trips-y'know, interviews at these companies-and they'd always make me job offers but I'd politely decline and hand them my business card and say, But if you'd like any work done on a contract basis ...' Instead of Senior House, 4 Ames St., Atkinson 202, I listed my address as 4 Ames St., Mail Stop A202. Once I show I can deliver on-time and on-budget these people don't even care where I live. I haven't even met half of my client contacts. It's all by phone and FedEx floppy disk mailers."
“你为什么想参加房地产研讨会？听起来你已经做得很好了。”
"Why do you want to go to a real estate seminar? Sounds like you're doing really well already."
“税费让我吃不消。我得留点收入。另外，我的继父是个混蛋。我的意思是，他认为既然我赚了几块钱，他就不应该支付我的大学费用。我说我不应该因为我的主动性而受到惩罚。如果我圣诞节回来告诉他我刚买了一栋二十套公寓楼，那他可真要伤心死了。”
"Taxes are killing me. I gotta shelter some income. Besides, my stepfather is a jerk. I mean, he thinks that since I'm making a few bucks he shouldn't have to pay my college expenses. And I say I shouldn't be penalized for my initiative. It'd get him where it hurts if I come back at Christmas and tell him I just bought a twenty-unit apartment building."
约翰尼·文图尔 (Johnny Venture) 站在万豪长码头会议室前面说道：“你想成为里奇 (Riiiich) 吗？”
Johnny Venture stood at the front of the Marriott Long Wharf conference room and said, "You wanna be Riiiich?"
“是啊！”超过两百人的人群齐声说道。
"Yessss!" the crowd of over two hundred said.
“你想一生平安吗！”
"You wanna be Set for Life!"
“是啊！”
"Yessss!"
“只要花费七百五十美元和两天的时间，你就能顺利实现财务独立。有人有疑问吗？”
"For seven hundred and fifty dollars and two days of your time you can be well on your way to financial independence. Does anyone have any questions?"
“是的，”黛安娜说。“我们可以不付首付，五年内付清全部款项吗？”
"Yes," Dianne said. "Can we take the course with no money down and a balloon payment in five years?"
在回老年公寓的路上，我问她是否愿意报名参加这个课程。
On the way back to Senior House I asked her whether she would sign up for the course.
“我想我会报名参加，带上耳塞和一个小笔记本，参加免费的第一次上午课程。当那个人解释折旧时，我会阅读课程活页夹并记下任何有用的提示。然后我会去斯隆商学院图书馆阅读一些后续读物。我真不敢相信这些人都是傻瓜。”
"I think I'll sign up for it and take earplugs and a little notepad to the complimentary first morning session. As the guy's explaining depreciation I'll read the course binder and make note of any helpful hints. Then I'll go to the Sloan B-school library for some follow-up reading. I can't believe what suckers the rest of these people are."
“哦，对了，”我说，“嗯，你打电话的时候我给他们开了一张支票。”
"Oh. Right," I said. "Well, I wrote them a check when you made one of your phone calls."
10 月 30 日
October 30
财团会议。卡特彼勒公司的澳大利亚人菲利普·休斯问道：“图表上的线条宽度有什么意义吗？它与预期的实验误差有关吗？”他指的是我的透明胶片。
Consortium meeting. Philip Hughes, the Aussie from Caterpillar, asked, "Is there any significance to the width of the lines on your graphs? Does it have to do with expected experimental error?" He was referring to my transparencies.
“这跟我的魔术笔的宽度有关，”我回答道。他们喜欢这个笑话，笑了起来。赞助商几乎成了同事、同行和朋友。
"It has to do with the width of my magic marker," I answered. They liked the joke and laughed. The sponsors had become almost colleagues, peers, friends.
菲尔继续说道：“你认为你可以滑动透明胶片，这样，不是将燃烧的开始位置对齐，而是将指示喷射开始的箭头一个接一个地排列起来吗？”
Phil continued, "Do you suppose you could slide the transparencies so that, rather than lining up the start of combustion, you line up the arrows indicating start of injection one on top of the other?"
“当然可以。”我说道。
"Sure," I said.
只需稍微改变一下观察事物的方式，就能产生更深刻的洞察力。凯克教授是海伍德的同事，既是物理化学家，也是机械工程师，他立刻就认出了这个模式。
Just a slightly different way of looking at something can yield significantly amplified insight. Professor Keck, a colleague of Heywood's and as much a physical chemist as a mechanical engineer, recognized the pattern immediately.
“在我看来，”他说，“好像你可以把柴油燃烧分为两种不同的现象。一种是化学控制的近乎瞬时的燃烧，其中压力上升的唯一限制是燃烧反应的速度，根据化学反应的指数分支，燃烧反应的速度非常快。然后是混合控制的燃烧包络，即顶部的曲线。在这里，燃烧速度不能快于燃料和空气混合到燃烧所需的化学比例。”
"It looks to me," he said, "as if you can separate the diesel combustion into two distinct phenomena. There is the chemically controlled nearly instantaneous combustion, where the only limit on pressure rise is the speed of the combustion reaction, which, based on the exponential branching of the chemical reactions, is very fast. And then you have the mixing controlled combustion envelope, the curve on the top. Here the rate of combustion can be no faster than the fuel and air mix to the chemical proportions necessary for combustion."
凯克教授继续说道：“在高温实验中，点火延迟时间更短，因此更多的燃烧是由混合控制的。在低温情况下，点火延迟时间更长，燃烧开始时更多的燃料已准备就绪。但在每种情况下，混合率都接近相同，因此较长的点火延迟实验在燃烧最终开始时会立即赶上混合控制曲线。”
Professor Keck continued, "With your higher-temperature experiments, you have shorter ignition delays, and hence more of the combustion is mixing-controlled. In the lower-temperature cases, you have longer ignition delays, and more fuel is ready to go when combustion is initiated. But the mixing rate is close to the same in each case, so the longer ignition delay experiments instantaneously catch up with the mixing-controlled curve when combustion is finally initiated."
谢谢您，凯克教授。谢谢您，菲利普·休斯。您刚刚写了我论文的“结论”一章。随着发动机燃料和空气温度的升高，燃料开始燃烧得更快。
Thank you, Professor Keck. Thank you, Philip Hughes. You just wrote the "Conclusions" chapter of my thesis. As you raise the temperature of the engine's fuel and air, the fuel starts to burn sooner.
11 月 15 日
November 15
“他们要送我去休斯顿，尼克。斯伦贝谢想让我去参观一下工厂，”我告诉他。
"They're going to fly me to Houston, Nick. Schlumberger wants me to come down for a plant trip," I told him.
“嘿，船长，太好了。恭喜你。几年前，实验室的一名学生去面试了他们。这是一次非常艰难的面试，”他说。他们问了他各种技术问题，比如电热水壶插头是如何工作的，下午他们甚至还给他做了电子测试，”尼克回答道。
"Hey, Cap'n, that's great. Congratulations. One of the students from the lab went to interview with them a couple of years ago. A real tough interview, he said. They asked him all kinds of technical questions, like how does a spahk plug work, and they even gave an electronics test in the afternoon," Nick answered.
我想，我最好把去年夏天的笔记抹掉。我最好弄清楚火花塞的工作原理。我在简历上告诉那个人我是乔·迪塞尔发动机，我在发动机实验室工作。如果我不知道火花塞的工作原理，那对我来说就不太好。
I'd probably better brush off my notes from last summer, I thought. And I'd really better find out how a spark plug works. Here I've told the guy I'm Joe Diesel Engine on my resume, and I work in an engine lab. It wouldn't look good for me not to know how a spark plug works.
“说吧，尼克，火花塞是如何工作的？”
"Say, Nick, how does a spark plug work?"
“到黑板来吧，船长，”他说。
"C'mon over to the blackboard, Cap'n," he said.
“你看，嘿，你拿的是电池，电压是 12 伏。它连接到变压器，嘿，点火线圈。然后你拿到了接触断路器，那只是一个开关，当旋转的凸轮轴推动它上下移动时，它会在正确的时间打开和关闭。在变压器的次级侧，你拿到了分电器的转子臂，当活塞处于正确的位置时，它会使电流流向火花塞。明白了吗？”
"See, heeyuh yuh got the batt'ry, that's at 12 volts. An' that's connected to this transformuh heeyuh, the ignition coil. Then you got the contact breaker, that's just a switch that opens an' closes at the right time when the rotatin' cam shaft pushes it up an' down. On the secondary side of the transformuh, you got the distributor's rotor arm that makes the electric current go to the spahk plug when the piston's at the right place. Got it?"
“嗯。”
"Uh huh."
“很好。现在，当接触断路器闭合时，来自电池的电流通过接触断路器回到地面。当它这样做时，它会在线圈的初级侧产生磁场。一旦磁场变得足够大，接触断路器再次打开，然后砰！初级侧的磁场就会崩溃。电流被吸入电容器，并使次级磁场的电压上升到 20,000 甚至 35,000 伏。这些电压足以使电流跳过火花塞的间隙，并点燃发动机中的燃料。”
"Good. Now when the contact breaker closes, current from the batt'ry heeyuh goes through the contact breaker back to ground. When it does that, it stahts a magnetic field in the primary side of the coil. Once the field gets big enough, the contact breaker opens up again, and pow! The field in the primary side collapses. The current soughta gets sucked into the condensor heeyuh, and makes the volts in the secondary field go way up, to 20,000, even 35,000 volts. That's enough volts to make the current jump the gap in the spahk plug, an' it lights off the fuel in the engine."
它就像 Doc Edgerton 的频闪灯，只是威力稍微弱一些。
It was just like Doc Edgerton's strobe light, only a little less powerful.
“这太棒了，尼克，”我说。“你介意我画个草图吗？”
"This is great, Nick," I said. "Do you mind if I make a little sketch of it?"
“好吧。把它写在一张小纸片上，然后放进钱包里。也许有一天它会派上用场。”
"Showah. Put it on a little piece a paper an' put it in your wallet. It might come in handy someday."
11 月 17 日
November 17
这是飞往休斯顿的夜班航班，现在我知道了喷气发动机的工作原理，也知道了静力学和 O 形环、铆钉的压力以及机翼在掉落前可以上下拍动多少次，所以坐飞机的感觉很不一样。但我没有时间坐公共汽车。
It was a night flight to Houston, and the airplane felt different now that I knew how jet engines worked, and I knew about statics and 0-rings and the stress on the rivets and how many times the wings could flap up and down before they fell off. But I didn't have time to take the bus.
我记得从布鲁塞尔到波士顿的陡峭下降路线。从那时起我变了吗？我是米基克教授所说的专业人士吗？坐在我旁边的两位商人讨论着希金斯退休后谁将领导他们公司的阀门部门。最有可能的候选人有一栋大房子和一个漂亮的妻子。
I remembered the steep descent into Boston from Brussels. Had I changed since then? Was I the professional that Professor Mikic said they would make me? The two businessmen in the seats beside me discussed who would head up the valve division of their company after Higgins retired. The most likely candidate had a big house and a pretty wife.
11 月 18 日
November 18
另外还有四位面试者，他们都来自名校：普林斯顿大学、斯坦福大学、加州理工大学、圣母大学。其中两位看起来像足球运动员，这可能给他们带来优势；在石油钻井平台上工作是一项艰苦的工作。我不知道我的学院风角质框眼镜和细条纹西装是有帮助还是有害。
There were four other interviewees, all from good schools: Princeton, Stanford, Cal Polytech, Notre Dame. Two of them looked like football players, which might give them an edge; it's rough work, working on oil rigs. I wondered whether my preppy horn-rimmed glasses and pin-striped suit would help or hurt.
上午是工作简报会。视频里，工作人员在钻取土壤岩心样本，一次钻探数十小时，而年轻、睡眠不足的现场工程师（年龄不及我）则在电脑上输入指令，向甲板上的阿拉伯人下达命令。视频里，现场工程师在阿曼公司的度假村休养两周，在游泳池边放松聊天。看起来很刺激。努力工作，收入丰厚，五年后就能过上好日子——多划算啊。我在西装外套口袋里的小笔记本上记了一些笔记。
The morning was a briefing session about the job. Movies of crews running core samples of the earth, drilling for tens of hours at a time while the youthful, sleep-deprived field engineer no older than I punched commands into the computer and gave orders to the Arabian men on the deck. Movies of the field engineers relaxing and chatting next to the pool on their two weeks' recuperation at the company resort in Oman. It looked exciting. Hard work, good money, set for life in five years-what a deal. I jotted a few notes in the little notebook that fit in my suit jacket pocket.
上午的面试没有什么评价，除了 Theunissen 和另一位面试官——一位拥有博士学位的英国人（也许他觉得自己没有充分就业，我在小笔记本上记下了这一点）——看起来好像在打量我们，并且在我们提问并试图表现出热情时记下我们的笔记。
The morning was nonevaluative, except for the fact that Theunissen and the other interviewer, a British guy with a Ph.D. (maybe he feels underemployed, I jotted in my little notebook), both looked as if they were sizing us up and taking mental notes as we asked questions and tried to look enthusiastic.
“现在，您认为现场工程师最大的单一事故源是什么？”特尼森在第二部电影放映后问道。危险肯定让他们很难招到人，即使工资很高。
"Now, what do you think the single largest source of accidents is for the field engineers?" Theunissen asked after the second movie. The danger must make it hard for them to hire people, even with the high money.
我建议道：“看起来这些钻井平台上有很多重物。我猜偶尔会有东西落在某人的脚或脚踝上并压坏一些东西。”我觉得这似乎很有道理。石油钻井平台不会每天都爆炸。
I suggested, "It looks as if there's a lot of heavy stuff on those rigs. I'd imagine occasionally something lands on someone's foot or ankle and mashes something." It seemed plausible enough, I thought. Oil rigs don't blow up every day.
英国人记下了一张小纸条。特乌尼森说：“实际上，这是汽车事故；所以如果你是个安全驾驶员，你应该没事。”
The British guy jotted down a little note. Theunissen said, "Actually, it's automobile accidents; so if you're a safe driver, you should be fine."
当然。你有得出这个结论的报告吗？我可以看一下吗？
Sure. Do you have a copy of the report that came up with that conclusion? Could I glance through it for a second?
我们去 The Sagebrush 吃午餐。毕竟，这里是休斯顿。我坐在英国人的黄色奔驰车前排，车内有棕色真皮内饰和电动门锁。
For lunch we went to The Sagebrush. This was, after all, Houston. I rode in the front seat of the British guy's yellow Mercedes with brown leather interior and electric door locks.
“你好，桑丹斯，”特尼森对女服务员说。“我要两杯血腥玛丽，和往常一样。”然后他转向我说：“点单吧，喝吧，这是关于石油工业的。”
"Hello, Sundance," Theunissen said to the waitress. "I'll have the usual; two Bloody Marys." Then he turned my way and said, "Go ahead and order; drink up, it's on the oil industry."
“我想要一杯橙汁。”我说。
"I'll have an orange juice," I said.
他的左眉毛上扬到发际线。“怎么？你不想要更猛烈的吗？”
His left eyebrow went up to his hairline. "What? Don't you want anything stronger?"
“我不喝酒。”我回答。
"I don't drink," I answered.
斯坦福点了冰茶、普林斯顿牛奶和圣母院姜汁汽水。我不知道他们是不想喝酒还是想在考试前保持清醒。午饭后，在去车的路上，我在小本子上记了一些笔记。
Stanford ordered iced tea, Princeton milk, Notre Dame ginger ale. I wondered whether it was because they didn't want to drink or whether they wanted to be sharp for the test. On the way to the car after lunch I jotted some notes on my little pad.
考试很简单，因为我只准备了几个小时。考试内容都是暑期电子课程前两周的内容，再加上 611 的前十五分钟的内容。加州理工学院的成绩是双 E 和全 A，看起来特别想在半小时的测验中取得好成绩。
The test was a piece of cake, what with the couple of hours of preparing I'd done. It was all stuff from the first two weeks in the summer electronics course, plus a little stuff from the first fifteen minutes of six one eleven. Cal Polytech, a double E with straight A's, looked particularly intent on doing well on the half-hour quiz.
我们做完作业 10 分钟后，Theunissen 和那位英国人把试卷还给了我。满分 15 分，我得了 12 分。加州理工学院得了 11 分，其他人都低于 10 分。
Theunissen and the British guy handed them back ten minutes after we were done. I had twelve out of fifteen points. Cal Polytech had eleven, the others were all below ten.
哈哈。原来我也不是那么笨，只是在麻省理工学院，与周围环境相比，你总会觉得自己很笨。
Ha. So I'm not such a dummy after all; it's just that at MIT you always feel dumb by comparison to the environment.
现在进行口试，与 Theu nissen 进行最后一次面试。我已经准备好回答第一个问题了。他说：“现在，我认为，作为一个优秀的美国人，你会拥有一辆汽车，而作为一个优秀的工程师，你会自己修理汽车。你能告诉我火花塞的工作原理吗？”
And now for the oral exam, the final interview with Theu nissen. I was ready for the lead-off question. He said, "Now, I suppose being a good American you own a car and being a good engineer you do your own work on it. Can you tell me how a spark plug works?"
我从钱包里掏出一张小纸片。“你知道，我听说这是你的一个问题。你介意我用笔记吗？”
I pulled the little sheet of paper out of my wallet. "You know, I heard that was one of your questions. Do you mind if I use notes?"
他眉毛又扬了起来。“是谁给你的？是其他哪个候选人泄露给你的？”
His eyebrow soared again. "Who gave that to you? Which one of the other candidates leaked that to you?"
“真的，没有。”我回答道，“我实验室的技术人员告诉我，这是你们面试时的标准问题。”
"None of them, really," I answered. "The technician in my lab told me it was a standard interview question for you guys."
“好吧，”他难以置信地说道。“听着。我知道你是个聪明的孩子。我知道你能胜任这份工作。你想要这份工作吗？”
"Okay," he said incredulously. "Look. I know you're a smart kid. I know you can do the work. Do you want this job?"
我不知道这是公司面试手册在说话，还是 Theunissen 本人在说话。
I wondered whether it were the corporate interview manual talking or Theunissen himself.
“我想要钱。”我回答。
"I want the money," I answered.
“你已经告诉我了。我很欣赏你的诚实。但你想要这份工作吗？如果你能做任何你想做的事，你会做什么？”
"You already told me that. I appreciate your honesty. But do you want the job? What would you do if you could do anything you want?"
又一个有倾向性的问题。但请诚实回答。霍普金斯大学的胡克院长在我即将参加罗德奖学金面试时告诉我的（我没有获得该奖学金）。诚实回答，说出你脑海中浮现的第一件事，你就会脱颖而出。大多数人都试图告诉面试官他想听到的内容，而一个好的面试官可以判断你是否这样做了。
Another loaded question. But answer honestly. That's what Dean Hooker at Hopkins told me when I was about to go to my interview for a Rhodes Scholarship (I didn't get it). Answer honestly, say the first thing that pops into your mind, and you'll stand out. Most people try to tell the interviewer what he wants to hear and a good interviewer can tell when you're doing that.
“嗯，你知道，我算是环保主义者，我很欣赏你们所做的一切——我是说我有时也会开车——但我真的很想努力让管道的另一端，也就是用户端，变得更有效率。也许可以去工厂做些咨询，发明一些更高效的产品。”
"Well, you know, I'm kind of an environmentalist, and I appreciate what you guys do-I mean I drive a car sometimes, too-but I'd really like to work on making the other end of the pipeline, the user end, more efficient. Maybe do some consulting in factories, invent some products that are more efficient."
似乎他自己越来越不像面试手册那样重要了。“那你为什么不现在就这么做呢？”他问道。
It seemed to be more and more of him, not the interview manual. "So why don't you do that now?" he asked.
“有一点积蓄是有帮助的。我想我可以为你工作五年，看看世界，然后再做那件事。”
"It helps to have a nest egg. I figure I could work for you five years, see the world, and then do that."
他回答说：“你知道，这原本是我计划的，但五年后，薪水很高，他们还给了我一大笔奖金，让我进入管理层，所以我就来了。你对这份工作还有其他顾虑吗？”
He answered, "You know, that was my plan originally, but after five years, the pay was great and they offered me a huge bonus to move into management, so here I am. Do you have any other concerns about the job?"
“我多久能回家一次？我父亲病了，在他离开我们之前，我希望每两年能见到他一次以上。”
"How often could I come home? My father's been ill, and I'd like to be able to see him more than once every two years before he leaves us."
听到这句话，特尼森微微扬了扬眉毛。“我们可以每年送你回家一次。除此之外，你就得靠自己了。”
Theunissen raised his eyebrow only slightly on that one. "We can get you home once a year on the company. Beyond that you're on your own."
是的。从 罗利达勒姆 到 吉隆坡 的往返机票价格是多少？
Right. What's the round-trip airfare from Raleigh-Durham to Kuala Lumpur?
他继续说道：“好吧，我们可能会给你一个报价。祝你一路平安。”
He continued, "Well, we'll probably make you an offer. Have a good flight home."
在去机场的出租车上，我把手伸进外套口袋，想在小记事本上做进一步的记录。哦，我把它放在桌子上了。他们会找到它，将笔迹与测试结果进行比较，了解我内心深处的想法和对测试的观察。
In the cab on the way to the airport, I reached into my coat pocket to make some further notes in my little pad. Uh oh. I left it on the table. They'll find it, compare the handwriting with the tests, and see my innermost thoughts and observations about them.
有时候决定权并不在你。
Sometimes the decision is not yours.
章节
C H A P T E R
19
19
不是的
No It Isn't
漩涡水流……（查尔斯）冷静的查尔斯涉水，感觉入侵新鲜溅起的冲突后醒来，灰烬现在深及腰部，不知道它会如何结束。胸深，眼深，希望我有一个朋友我所有的战斗都如此艰苦，我所有的努力都导致......到......毫无意义......
Swirling Waters ... (the Charles) Cool Charles wading, senses invading fresh splashed wake from clashes before ashes waist deep now, don't know how it will end. chest deep, eye deep, wish I had a friend All my battles so hard fought, All my efforts lead ... to ... nought...
11 月 19 日
November 19
有人把这首诗钉在我公寓对面的墙上。我以为去年 12 月沃森事件让我获得了免费食宿。但是不，研究所的环境并没有松懈。
Somebody'd pinned the poem on the wall across from my apartment. And I thought I'd earned my free room and board last December with the Watson incident. But nooooo; the institute environment does not relent.
我打电话给约翰·多尔西。“看看你能不能找出是谁把它贴在那里的，”他说。“也试着争取其他学生的帮助。”
I called John Dorsey. "See whether you can figure out who put it up there," he said. "Try to enlist the help of some of the other students, too."
楼下的大厅里正在进行一场杜松子酒游戏。埃尔登是四个玩家之一。“我不知道我是否能撑过这个学期，”他说。
Downstairs the gin game was going on in the hall. Eldon was one of the four players. "I don't know whether I'm going to make it through the term," he said.
啊，嫌疑犯。“为什么不呢？”我问。
Ah, a suspect. "Why not?" I asked.
“我一直想成为一名宇航员。要成为一名任务专家，你需要拥有博士学位，更不用说能够跑进 2 小时 30 分钟的马拉松。但要从这里获得博士学位，我需要的 A 比 B 多，而我在两门课上都拿到了 C，而我才大二。如果我得到两个 C，那将是荡秋千或游泳，”他说。
"I've always wanted to be an astronaut. To be a mission specialist you need a Ph.D., not to mention being able to run a sub 2:30 marathon. But to get a Ph.D. from here I'll need more A's than B's and I'm pushing C's in two of my classes and I'm only a sophomore. If I get two C's, it'll be swing or swim," he said.
“你是什么意思？”我问他。
"What do you mean?" I asked him.
“你知道，荡秋千……”他跳起来，用一只手臂抓住蒸汽加热管，身体的其他部分也软绵绵地垂下来，头也无力地向前垂下。
"You know, swing . . ." and he jumped up and caught the steam heating pipe with one arm and let the rest of himself go limp and his head fall limply forward.
“你做得真好，埃尔登。我仍然认为你应该放弃工程学，去纽约参加一些试镜。”
"You do that really well, Eldon. I still think you should bag engineering and head to New York for some auditions."
“等一下，我还没完，”他强调道。“……或者游泳。”他放开管子，趴在地上，胳膊和腿伸直，就像在东河里那样。
"Wait, I'm not through," he said emphatically. "... or swim." He let go of the pipe and lay prone on the floor with his arms and legs stretched out the way they do in the East River.
是时候换个话题了。“你认为爱国者队能进入季后赛吗？”
Time to change the subject. "Do you think the Patriots will make it to the playoffs?"
“谁在乎？”埃尔登说。“这是什么，国家不合逻辑的推断日还是什么？”
"Who cares?" Eldon said. "What is this, national non sequitur day or something?"
“是的，”辛迪说。“我一直在读一本关于抑郁症的书。书上说，无论何时人们谈论自杀，不管以何种方式，你都应该让他们谈论。他们想谈论它，就像他们在寻求帮助一样。”
"Yeah," Cindy said. "I've been reading a book about depression. It says that whenever people talk about suicide, in any way, you should let them talk about it. They want to talk about it, like, they're asking for help."
“好的，”我说，“继续说吧，埃尔登。”
"Okay," I said. "Keep talking, Eldon."
“嗯，你知道有些杂志会宣传如何做到这一点。还有书籍。还有邮购工具包。”
"Well, you know there are magazines that advertise how to do it. There are books. There are mail order kits."
我试图安慰他。“听着，你不能去找你的教授，让他帮助你更好地理解材料吗？你仍然可以在每门课上拿到 B，下学期争取拿 A。”
I tried to reassure him. "Look, can't you go to one of your professors and have him help you understand the material better? You can still probably pull a B out of each of the classes and go for the A next term."
埃尔登回答说：“我试过了。但是那家伙的态度很怪异，好像他一直问我问题，好像他喜欢让我觉得自己很蠢。后来我去找了另一位教授，结果还是一样。我想我会停在两次尝试之后。就好像‘如果你自己都搞不清楚，孩子，你就不属于这里。当你身处现实世界中那个摆满绘图桌和计算机终端的大房间时，没有人会牵着你的手。’”
Eldon answered, "I tried that. But the guy had this attitude about him, like he kept asking me questions, and it was like he enjoyed making me feel stupid. Then I went to another professor and the same thing happened. I figured I'd stop at two strikes. It's like 'If you can't figure it out for yourself, kid, you don't belong here. Nobody's going to take you by the hand when you're in the middle of that big room full of drafting tables and computer terminals in the real world.'"
“这首诗是你写的吗？”我问他。
"Did you write that poem?" I asked him.
他模仿凯瑟琳·赫本。“诗，什么诗？我不知道你在说什么……”
He did Katharine Hepburn. "Poem, what poem? I have no idea what you're talking about...."
“来吧，小甜心。承认吧。”我回到博吉身边。
"Come on, Schweetheart. Admit it." I went back to Bogie.
“不，说真的，我不知道你在说什么。”这不是埃尔登。
"No, seriously though, I don't know what you're talking about." It wasn't Eldon.
黛安娜走进房间，拿出一个尼龙套索。“这是我大二时捡到的。愚人节那天我带着它到处走。真的吓坏了导师；他把它拿走了，年底再还给我。你看。高品质尼龙——它可能能承受 500 磅。”
Dianne went into her room and brought out a nylon noose. "I picked this up as a hack my sophomore year. I carried it around on April Fools Day. Really freaked out the tutor; he took it away from me and gave it back at the end of the year. Just look at it. High-quality nylon-it'd probably carry 500 pounds."
埃尔登精神一振。“这样，我们两三个人就可以聚在一起，一起玩个痛快了。”
Eldon perked up. "With that, two or three of us could get together and have a gang hang."
“来吧，伙计们。让我们开心起来。这个地方并不那么糟糕，”我说。
"Come on, guys. Let's be happy. This place isn't so bad," I said.
“哦，是吗？”埃尔登回答道。“那么，今天我怎么样？我已经告诉过你我离两个 C 不远了。这是基于我今天收到的两份测试。两份都比班级平均水平低 15 分。我妈妈今晚打电话来，她说他们为我感到骄傲，他们为我的成功感到高兴，在西尔斯夜班工作以凑足学费很辛苦，但这是值得的。然后在回航空电子实验室的路上，在无尽的走廊上，我认识或以为认识的三个人没有打招呼；他们的眼睛只是向前微笑。”
"Oh, yeah?" Eldon answered. "Well, how about my day today? I already told you I'm well on my way to two C's. That was based on the two tests I got back today. Both were 15 points below class average. My mother called tonight and she said how proud they are of me and how happy they are I'm so successful and how it's rough working at Sears nights to pull together the money for tuition but it's worth it. Then on the way back to the avionics lab three people I knew or thought I knew on the infinite corridor didn't say hi; their eyes were just beaming forward."
“他们可能只是在忙于一些问题或别的什么，”我说，“我们都会遇到不顺心的日子。”
"They were probably just preoccupied with some problem set or something," I said. "We all have bad days."
“是的，我想你说得对，”埃尔登说。“但有时我感觉麻省理工学院就像一条我必须杀死的恶龙。”
"Yeah, I guess you're right," Eldon said. "But sometimes it feels like MIT is a dragon I have to slay."
11 月 22 日
November 22
这次导师会议是为了准备拍摄一部关于核爆的电视电影《后天》。
The tutor meeting was to prepare for "The Day After," the madefor-TV film about being nuked.
“现在我希望你们在电影播出后注意任何警告信号，”约翰·多尔西说。“你们可能想就此成立一个讨论小组。让学生们讨论一下。这部电影可能含有令人反感的内容。建议观众谨慎观看。学院担心这部电影可能会使人们感到沮丧，可能会发生集体自杀。我们必须采取措施防止这种情况发生。”
"Now I want you all to be on the lookout for any warning signs after it's aired," John Dorsey said. "You might want to have some kind of discussion group about it. Let the students talk through it. The film contains material that may be offensive. Viewer discretion is advised. The institute is worried that it might depress people, that there may be mass suicide. We have to take steps to prevent that."
看电影的那个晚上，我都在看书，没有看电视。从学生中心图书馆回来的路上，无尽的走廊上到处都是标语。为什么没有希望？其中一个写着。为什么学院没有希望？我想知道这是否是某个人想出来的恶作剧，一种让读者陷入危及生命的抑郁的方式。我把能拿到的每一张都撕了下来。
I spent the evening of the movie reading, not watching TV. On the way back from the student center library, there were signs up and down the infinite corridor. WHY IS THERE No HOPE? one said. WHY IS THE INSTITUTE HOPELESS? I wondered whether it was somebody's idea of a sick joke, a way to push the reader into a life-threatening depression. I ripped down every one I could put my hands on.
电影结束后，我组织大家喝牛奶、吃饼干。“电影不太好，”黛安娜说。“人物发展不够。”
I hosted a milk and cookies break after the movie. "It wasn't that great," Dianne said. "The character development just wasn't there."
“是的，”埃尔登说。“而且特效完全是假的。如果他们想真正达到效果，他们应该放映广岛和长崎的真实影片。当真实事件发生时，破坏程度将比电影中显示的严重得多。”
"Yeah," Eldon said. "And the special effects were like totally fakey. If they wanted to be really effective they should have shown the real films from Hiroshima and Nagasaki. When the real thing happens the destruction will be a lot worse than they showed in that movie."
“会，埃尔登，会。谈论这类事情时，一定要使用条件句。”
"Would, Eldon, would. Always use the conditional when talking about these kinds of things."
11 月 23 日
November 23
学生报纸《科技报》刊登了一篇关于黑人女性迪安·霍普被解雇的报道。这解释了这些迹象。
The Tech, the student newspaper, ran a story about the firing of Dean Hope, a black woman. That explained the signs.
11 月 24 日
November 24
我和办公室同事讲着黄笑话。走廊的门开着。有时你会忘记实验室里也有女人；你说的话可能会害死人。但笑话很有趣，当其他人嘲笑我的时候，我觉得自己就像是其中一个男人。谈话转向对实验室里和机械工程系里各种女人的长相进行排名。女人在一起的时候会做这种事，对吧？这是很自然的，对吧？
My office mates and I were telling dirty jokes. The door to the hall was open. Sometimes you forget that women are in the lab, too; that what you say might kill someone. But the jokes were funny, and I felt like one of the guys when the other guys laughed at mine. The conversation drifted toward ranking the looks of the various women in the lab, and in the Mech E department in general. Women do this kind of thing when they're together, right? It's natural, right?
其中一个男人说：“是啊，玛丽身材不错，但脸就没那么好看了。”我们都笑了起来。她从敞开的门边走过，没有往里看。我不知道她是否听到了。这是我最后一次见到她。
One of the guys said, "Yeah, Mary's got a nice body but her face isn't that great." We all sort of chuckled. She walked by the open door, didn't look in. I wondered whether she heard it. It was the last time I saw her.
我不知道她为什么这么做。谁知道是不是因为最后那句小话？谁知道是不是因为我没有为她辩护？从第一学期开始，我们就疏远了。我跟她打招呼，她会对我露出那种高级宿舍式的强颜欢笑，那其实是一种拙劣的微笑，因为在这个地方怎么可能有人会快乐？但她在户外俱乐部有朋友，而且有传言说她有男朋友，所以我没有责任问她为什么不再跟我说话了。我们是自己灵魂的主人，对吧？这不是我的错。这不是我的错。这不是我的错，对吧？
I don't know why she did it. Who knows whether it was that last little comment? Who knows whether it was the fact that I didn't say anything in her defense? We'd sort of drifted apart since the first term. I'd say hello and she'd give me that Senior House forced smile that is really a parody on a smile because how could anyone possibly be happy at this place? But she had her friends in the outdoors club and rumor had it she had a boyfriend, so it wasn't my responsibility to ask her why she wasn't talking to me much anymore. We're the masters of our souls, right? It wasn't my fault. It wasn't my fault. It wasn't my fault, was it?
这不是压力。她太聪明了，不会让压力影响她。也许是因为孤独。但她有男朋友。也许是麻省理工学院过于机械化的世界观激发了她的绝望，在这种世界观中，逻辑和理性是神，而灵性、灵魂和人性在最好的情况下被认为是无关紧要的，在最坏的情况下则被认为是不存在的。
It wasn't the pressure. She was too smart to let that do it. Maybe it was the loneliness. But she had a boyfriend. Perhaps it was the hopelessness spurred on by MIT's overmechanistic worldview, in which logic and reason are gods and spirituality, soul, and humanity are dismissed as irrelevant at best and nonexistent at worst.
第二天早上，切特请我到他的办公室。他关上了身后的门。
The following morning Chet asked me into his office. He closed the door behind me.
“坐下，”他说。“我有个非常坏的消息。昨晚玛丽自杀了。”
"Have a seat," he said. "I've got some very bad news. Last night Mary took her own life."
她把它带到哪儿了？
Where'd she take it?
但说实话。“怎么……怎么……？”我问道。
But seriously. "How'd ... How'd ... ?" I asked.
“他们今天早上在雪佛兰 ...
"They found her in her Chevette this morning. I've checked with everyone. Campus police, her landlord, Cambridge police, the dean's office. I keep getting the same story, but I can't believe it happened. It's Mary all right," Chet answered. His eyes blinked a little. "She put some tubing from the tail pipe of her car into the passenger section. She was parked over on Albany Street. And she just sort of fell asleep."
我想知道，让我们看看。如果汽车怠速为 800 rpm，排量为 2 升，那么进入汽车的体积流量将为每分钟 400 升，乘以废气中一氧化碳的百分比。我们必须建立一个汽车乘客区一氧化碳浓度的微分方程，假设流入率和排气率相等。这有点像给一个漏气的硬气球充气，另一端有一个洞。我们必须对乘客的呼吸频率做出另一个假设。假设肺活量为 2 升，每分钟呼吸 20 次，这意味着乘客舱气体每分钟 40 升。现在，要模拟一氧化碳进入肺部的速率，我们需要……
Let's see, I wondered. If the car is idling at, say 800 rpm, and the displacement is, say, 2 liters, then the volume flow rate into the car will be 400 liters per minute, times the percentage of carbon monoxide in the exhaust gas. We'll have to set up a differential equation for the concentration of carbon monoxide in the passenger section of the car, assuming equal inflow rates and exhaust rates. It's sort of like filling up a leaky rigid balloon with a hole in the other end. We'll have to make another assumption about the breathing rate of the passenger. Figure a 2-liter lung capacity and 20 breaths per minute, that means 40 liters per minute of passenger compartment gas. Now to model the rate of carbon monoxide uptake into the lungs we need to ...
Nerdalert。玛丽的声音几乎可以听见，就像有一次在 Thermo 课上，当某人的手表在整点时发出哔哔声时，她说“Nerdalert”。就这样。我完了。他们抓住我了。
Nerdalert. Mary's voice was almost audible, like the time she said, "Nerdalert" when somebody's watch beeped at the top of the hour in Thermo class. That's it. I'm done. They've got me.
我心里一紧。我也不敢相信。到 26 岁时，你可能听说过死亡，也许失去了几只宠物，但如果你的父母都还健在，而且你认识的人中没有一个去世，你仍然会觉得对死亡免疫。
The knot in my stomach tightened. I couldn't believe it, either. By the time you're twenty-six you may have heard of death, maybe lost a few pets, but if both your parents are still alive and no one you know really well has passed away, you still feel kind of immune to it.
“追悼会将于下周日晚上举行，”切特说，“在教堂里。嘿，孩子，顺便说一句，我对你的工作提出了批评，但这样做的目的是帮助你学习，这样你就可以离开这里，变得有能力，做人们期望麻省理工学院毕业生能做的专业工作。你的实验技术确实进步了。你很擅长解决问题。”
"The memorial service will be next Sunday night," Chet said, "in the chapel. Hey, kiddo, by the way, I've had my criticisms of your work, but the reason is to help you learn so you can go out of here and be competent and do the good professional work that people expect out of people with MIT degrees. You've really come along in your experimental techniques. You're good at solving problems."
他夸奖了我。我简直不敢相信。切特夸奖了我。他说的话一定是真的，因为切特是不会撒谎的，即使在胁迫之下。
He paid me a compliment. I couldn't believe it. Chet paid me a compliment. And what he said must be true, because Chet is incapable of lying, even under duress.
我下楼去拍一些宝丽来照片，用于我论文的仪器部分。尼克在钻床旁。
I went downstairs to take some Polaroids for the apparatus section of my thesis. Nick was at the drill press.
电台播放着比莉·霍利戴 (Billie Holiday) 版的《有什么新鲜事？》。
"What's New?"-the Billie Holiday version-played on the radio.
尼克把手放在我的肩膀上说：“这件事太可怕了，太可怕了。永远不要让这样的事情发生在你身上，好吗，船长？上帝只希望你继续尽你所能；这才是最重要的。你会遇到一些不好的时候，但你会挺过去的。它来得太快了。”
Nick put his hand on my shoulder and said, "That's a terrible thing that happened, just a terrible thing. Don't ever let anything like that happen to you, OK, Cap'n? The Lord just wants you to keep doin' the best you can; that's all that matters. You'll have some bad times but you'll make it through. It happens too fast by itself."
当时我没有哭。我很坚强，我可以承受。我可以承受研究所给的任何惩罚。我把宝丽来照片交给了夏洛特·埃文斯；她正在帮我打印论文，并帮我处理数据，每页收费 3 美元。她也刚刚从切特那里听说了这个消息。
I didn't cry then. I was tough; I could take it. I could take anything the institute could dish out. I delivered the Polaroids to Charlotte Evans; she was typing my thesis for me and helping with the figures for $3 a page. She had just heard the news from Chet as well.
“可怜的家伙，”她在办公桌后面说道。“我对此感到很难过。你知道她为什么这么做吗？”
"The poor thing," she said from behind her desk. "I feel just awful about it. Do you have any idea why she did it?"
“不，真的没有。我们最近没怎么说话。我现在感觉有点难过，好像我应该问问她是不是有什么事让她烦恼。但是我们现在已经疏远了，现在再也不会在一起了，至少在这里不会。”
"No, not really. We didn't talk a lot recently. I feel kind of bad now, like I should have asked her whether something was bothering her. But we drifted apart and now we'll never drift back together, not here anyway."
夏洛特安慰道：“现在你别自责了。每个人都要对自己的行为负责，而不是别人的。此外，每年这个时候，很多人都过得很难受，因为圣诞节就要到了。现在你找不到心理医生，他们预约太满。圣诞节和春天，很多人都会感到沮丧，尤其是单身的人。”
Charlotte said comfortingly, "Now don't you go blaming your self. Everyone is responsible for his own actions and no one else's. Besides, a lot of people have a hard time this time of year, what with Christmas coming up and all. You can't get near a psychiatrist these days they're so heavily booked. Christmastime and springtime, a lot of people get depressed, especially if they're single."
我举手说：“我有罪。”我很好奇她怎么知道安排时间与精神科医生见面是件很难的事。
I raised my hand and said, "Guilty." I wondered how she knew it was hard to schedule time with a psychiatrist.
夏洛特开始着手做正事。“我已经打好了实验的简介和描述。我还打好了实验室照片的空白标题。这是手稿，供您阅读和校对。”她把整个马尼拉文件夹递给我。
Charlotte got down to business. "So I've typed the introduction and the description of the experiment. And I've typed the blank headings for the photos of the lab. Here's the manuscript for you to read through and proof." She handed me the full manila folder.
“谢谢，夏洛特。我几乎能尝到切特的招牌味道了。”
"Thanks, Charlotte. I can almost taste Chet's signature."
“没问题。一共八十一美元。如果你有现金的话我更喜欢现金。”
"No problem. That'll be eighty-one dollars. I'd prefer cash if you have it."
“我得去银行一趟。五点之前回来。”
"I'll have to go to the bank. I'll be back by five."
“很好，”我离开办公室时她说。“佩珀，”她补充道，“别工作太辛苦了。”
"Good," she said as I left the office. "And Pepper," she added, "don't work too hard."
“没有这种事……”我停顿了一下，没有说出标准答案。“呃，好的。我会尽量不这么做。”
"There's no such...." I paused from my standard response. "Uh, OK. I'll try not to."
三天后。两个女人看起来有点像玛丽，只是年纪大了一点，在靠近我门的走廊里迷茫地走着。我记得在靠近我门的走廊里迷茫的感觉。她们可能是我的姐姐。她们的眼睛仍然红红的。
Three days later. Two women who looked a little like Mary, only older, looked lost in the corridor near my door. I remembered feeling lost in the corridor near my door. They could have been my older sisters. Their eyes were still red.
“你知道我们怎么才能进这个办公室吗？”年纪大一点的那个问道。“玛丽·帕特森是我们妹妹，我们来这里是为了检查她的物品。”
"Do ... do you know how we can get into this office?" the older one asked. "Mary Patterson was our younger sister, and we've come to go through her belongings."
“呃，哎呀，我不知道。我可以跑到楼下的实验室去看看她的同事是否在附近。” 他们不在。
"Uh, gee, I don't know. I can run downstairs to the lab to see whether any of her office mates are around." They weren't.
“我给校警打电话，他们会来帮你开门的，”我说，“顺便说一下，我叫佩珀·怀特。”
"Let me call campus police and they can come and open up the door for you," I said. "By the way, my name's Pepper White."
“哦，原来你是佩珀，”大女儿说。“玛丽经常谈论你；她说她很喜欢你，还跟我们讲了一些你做过的事。”
"Oh, so you're Pepper," the older one said. "Mary talked a lot about you; she said she really liked you, and she told us about some of the things you'd done."
这是什么？是《生活多美好》主题的变奏吗？听着，我感觉已经够糟糕了，更别说她甚至在没跟我打招呼的时候还把我当成好朋友了。这里是盐矿，除了挖盐，我没时间做别的事，更别提去拉拢一个在阿卡普尔科度假时给我寄明信片并署名“爱你的玛丽”的人了，她给了我两年前我错过的热量和流体课程笔记的原件，还给自己复印了，她因为抑郁和我出去约会了几次。这不是我的错，不是吗？
What is this, a variation on the It's a Wonderful Life theme? Look, I feel bad enough as it is without knowing that she thought of me as a good friend even when she didn't say hello to me. This place is a salt mine and there's no time to do anything but mine salt, much less try to pull someone who sent me a postcard from her vacation in Acapulco and signed it "Love, Mary," who gave me the originals for the notes for the Thermo and Fluids classes I missed two years ago and made photocopies for herself, who went out on a couple of dates with me, out of a depression. It wasn't my fault, was it?
我说：“嗯，是的。我们都非常想念她。”
I said, "Uh, yeah. We all miss her very much."
“我们的父亲是一名物理学家，”她说，“我们想翻看她的笔记本，给他一些她正在研究的东西的例子。”
"Our father's a physicist," she said. "We'd like to go through her notebooks to give him some examples of what she was working on.,,
校警来了，开了门。我们把他们从 U-Haul 拿来的纸箱整理好，把玛丽的笔记本装进去，然后把它们搬到租来的货车上。
The campus policeman arrived and opened the door. We assembled the cardboard boxes they'd picked up from U-Haul, filled them with Mary's notebooks, carried them to the rented van.
“鱼缸怎么办？”我问他们。
"What about the fish tank?" I asked them.
“我们先不提这件事了，”姐姐说。“你能确保有人在几周内喂鱼并清理过滤器吗？”
"We'll leave it for now," the older sister said. "Could you make sure someone feeds the fish and cleans the filter for a couple of weeks?"
“当然了，”我说，“哎，我呃……真的很抱歉发生了这样的事。祝你一路平安。”
"Sure," I said. "Say, I'm uh . . . really sorry about what happened. Have a safe drive home."
“谢谢再见。”
"Thanks. Bye."
那天晚上，本和玛丽办公室里的收音机大声播放着 WBCN 的摇滚音乐，办公室的门是开着的。
That night. The radio in Ben and Mary's office played loud rock music from WBCN and the office door was open.
“哟，本。你能把声音调小一点吗？”我问他。
"Yo, Ben. Could you turn that down a little bit?" I asked him.
“啊？”他抬起头，不再看他的作业。“哦，是的。当然。很抱歉声音太大了。我想我是想驱赶可能在附近的任何恶灵；我的意思是，现在深夜玛丽不在了，这里有点吓人。每次我走进办公室，我都以为会看到她在办公桌前或朝另一边走去，但她再也不在那里了。我仍然不敢相信发生了这样的事。唯一剩下的就是鱼缸。我想知道鱼是否知道发生了什么，”他说。
"Huh?" he said, looking up from his problem set. "Oh. Yeah. Sure. Sorry it's so loud. I guess I want to sort of ward off any evil spirits that might be in the area; I mean it's kind of spooky here late at night now with Mary gone. Every time I walk into the office, I expect to see her at her desk or walking the other way, and she's never there anymore. I still can't believe it happened. The only thing that's left is the fish tank. I wonder whether the fish know what's going on," he said.
“哦，这提醒我了。你知道她把鱼食盒放哪儿了吗？我答应过她家人会照顾他们一段时间。”我说。
"Oh, that reminds me. Do you know where she kept the box of fish food? I promised her family I'd take care of them for a while," I said.
我们俩把食物撒在水面上，鱼儿们都急忙浮到水面来吃。
We both sprinkled the food on the water and the fish scurried up to the surface to eat.
本继续说道：“我试图想象她的痛苦，你知道，她当时的感受，是什么让她这么做的。她也很聪明。这是最可怕的事情。她每天都读《纽约时报》，知道世界上所有这些小国正在发生的事情。我怀疑她是否知道一些我们不知道的事情。”
Ben continued. "It's like I'm trying to imagine her pain, you know, how she felt, what made her do it. She was so smart, too. That's the scariest thing. She read the New York Times every day, knew everything about what was going on in all these little countries around the world. It's like I wonder whether she knew something we don't know."
我回答说：“谁知道呢，也许我们晚上值班时还能见到她，我们就能问问她。现在已过我的睡觉时间了。如果你想把收音机调大，那就开吧。”
I answered, "Who knows, maybe we'll see her again on the night shift and we'll be able to ask her. For now it's past my bedtime. If you want to turn the radio back up, go ahead."
“谢谢，”他说。“别紧张。”
"Thanks," he said. "Take it easy."
睡觉前，我从高级宿舍的文件柜里拿出布告栏上的手写诗，将其笔迹与玛丽给我的第一学期流体笔记进行了比较。笔记本上的笔迹与墙上的笔迹不符。这不是她的，但是谁的呢？
Before bed I took the bulletin board's handwritten poem out of my filing cabinet at Senior House and compared the handwriting to the first-semester Fluids notes that Mary gave me. The handwriting in the notebook didn't match the handwriting on the wall. It wasn't hers, but whose was it?
我躺在床上，听着收音机里播放的“Soft Hits”，渐渐进入了睡眠。
I lay in bed with "Soft Hits" playing on the radio and gradually drifted off to sleep.
那是夜晚，玛丽站在教堂前，对面是克雷斯基和学生中心。
It was night and Mary was standing in front of the chapel, across from Kresge and the student center.
“嗨，佩珀，”她说。
"Hi, Pepper," she said.
“嗨，玛丽。有什么新鲜事吗？”
"Hi, Mary. What's new?"
“哦，没什么。你呢？”她说。
"Oh, not much, how about you?" she said.
“我也是。哎呀，你一点都没变。”
"Me neither. Gee. You haven't changed a bit."
“你是什么意思？”她向我伸手问道。
"What do you mean?" she asked, reaching toward me.
“等一下，”我回答道，“你死了。”
"Wait a minute," I answered. "You're dead."
“嗯？哦。是的。当然。再见……”
"Huh? Oh. Yeah. Sure. Adieu...."
当史波克先生和柯克船长被传送到企业号星舰时，她闪烁了片刻，然后消失了。
And as when Mr. Spock and Captain Kirk are beamed up to the Starship Enterprise, she shimmered for a few moments and disappeared.
我的头猛地从枕头上抬起来。琳达·朗斯塔特和纳尔逊·里德尔管弦乐团一起唱起了这首轻快的歌曲：
My head jerked up from the pillow. Linda Ronstadt sang the soft hit with the Nelson Riddle orchestra:
... 但见到你真是太好了，你很贴心，伸出了手......
... but seeing you is grand, and you were sweet, to offer your hand ...
章节
C H A P T E R
20
20
质量控制
Quality Control
“风随意而吹，你听见风的响声，却不晓得从哪里来，往哪里去......
"The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth.... ..
-约翰福音 3:8
-JOHN 3:8
“……风……呼喊着……玛丽”
"... and the wind . . . cries . . . Mary"
-，二米
-,IIMI
12 月 18 日
December 18
我请求海伍德教授推荐我参加博士资格考试。
I asked Professor Heywood to recommend me for the doctoral qualifying exams.
“嗯，”他说，“那么你拿到博士学位后想做什么呢？”
"Hmmm," he said. "And just what is it that you'd like to do with a Ph.D.?-
我的朋友可以叫我“胡椒博士”。此外，考试应该会成为书中很好的一章。
My friends could call me Dr. Pepper. Besides, the exams should make for a really good chapter in the book.
“我想做咨询。我想为工业界提供节能方面的建议。这就是我来这里的初衷，我认为博士学位会有所帮助，”我回答道。“这会给我带来一定的信誉。”
"I want to consult. I want to advise industry on how to save energy. That's why I came here in the first place, and I think the Ph.D. would help," I answered. "It would give me a certain credibility."
“是的，”他说。“但这可能对你想要做的事情来说并不是必需的。事实上，现在进入行业并了解现实世界的运作方式可能对你更有利。你攻读博士学位所花费的三年或更长时间将包含这个机会成本。”
"Yes, it would," he said. "But it may not really be necessary for what you want to do. In fact, it may be much more advan tageous for you to go out into industry now and see how things work in the real world. The three years or more you'd spend on a Ph.D. would involve that opportunity cost."
“我不知道；我现在还是想尝试一下资格赛。如果我现在不尝试，我永远也不会参加。此外，你必须承认这将是一个复习我在这里学到的东西的好机会。”
"I don't know; I'd still like to give the qualifiers a shot now. If I don't try now, I'll never do them. Besides, you have to admit it would be a great opportunity to review what I've learned here."
“你的成绩怎么样？”
"How are your grades?"
“呃，呃，我……嗯，我有三个 C，两个 A，其余都是 B。但其中两个 C 是我第一学期得的，第三个是在暑期电子课上得的，所以它们不应该算数，对吧？”
"Uh, er, I, uh ... well, I have three C's, two A's, and the rest B's. But two of the C's were my first term and the third was in a summer electronics class so they shouldn't really count, should they?"
“一切都很重要。你将面临两次不利的处境。但如果你真的想参加考试，我会写这封信。你必须在考试的口试、笔试和演讲部分取得优异成绩，所以我建议你好好准备。”
"Everything counts. You'll be going in with two strikes against you. But if you really want to do it, I'll write the letter. You'll have to do remarkably well on the oral, written, and presentation components of the examinations, so I advise you to prepare well."
“谢谢您，教授。”
"Thank you, Professor."
那天下午，切特摇了摇头。
That afternoon, Chet shook his head.
“你真的想这么做吗？”他问道。
"You really want to go through with it?" he asked.
“是的，切特。我必须试一试。我知道这不太可能，但这是美国，我们热爱弱者，我们也喜欢成为弱者。我会哼唱《洛奇》的主题曲一整个月。”
"Yeah, Chet. I have to try. I know it's a long shot, but darn it this is America and we love an underdog, and we love to be underdogs. I'll be humming the 'Theme from Rocky' all month."
“好吧，我会签你的申请书。不过你要小心。好好学习，知道自己在说什么；否则他们会把你活活吃掉的。”
"Well, I'll sign your application. But be careful. Study hard, and know what you're talking about; otherwise they'll eat you alive. "
“好的，切特。我会尽力的。”
"Okay, Chet. I'll do my best."
资格限制是研究生与“某某博士”称号之间的一道障碍。考试存在的原因有几个。首先，它们让教授们的虐待狂性格有机会表达自己。其次，它们将研究生群体中的优秀人才与劣等生区分开来。瞧，如果他们让每个人都能轻松通过考试，那么更多的无能之辈就会被称为“某某博士”。如果他们让任何人通过考试，他或她可能会完成博士学位，在普林斯顿大学或斯坦福大学助理教授职位的面试中轻率地混过关，并且在教授热力学入门课程时被某个聪明的十九岁孩子活活吃掉。这比被麻省理工学院的某些教授活活吃掉更令人震惊，所以这种残忍是仁慈的。
The qualifiers are the barrier they put between graduate students and the ability to be called "Doctor So and So." The examinations exist for several reasons. First, they give the sadistic elements of the professors' characters an opportunity to express themselves. Second, they separate the chaff from the wheat of the graduate student body. See, if they made it easy for everyone to pass, more incompetents would be called "Doctor So and So." If they let anyone pass, he or she might finish a Ph.D., glibly sleaze through an interview for an assistant professorship at Princeton or Stanford, and, when teaching Intro Thermodynamics, be eaten alive by some bright nineteen-year-old. And that would be more devastating than being eaten alive by some MIT professors, so the cruelty is kind.
考试分为四个领域。周五是笔试部分。四个专业领域各有一小时的测试时间。每个学生都有一些考试科目可供选择，我选择了基础知识：流体、热力学、系统动力学和控制以及力学。然后周末就到了，让你大汗淋漓。我的意思是，我宁愿在周一、周二、周三进行考试，然后你消失不见，去滑雪，看看自己是否通过了考试，但这是他们的事，他们制定规则。
The examinations are in four areas. Friday is the written section. One hour of testing in each of four areas of specialization. Each student has some choices in the test subjects, and I chose the basics: Fluids, Thermo, System Dynamics and Controls, and Mechanics. Then the weekend comes just to make you sweat. I mean, I'd rather have it Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and then you disappear and go skiing and find out whether you passed, but it's their ballgame and they make the rules.
周一他们会对你进行口试。他们会给你出一道题；你有二十分钟的时间看它并尝试解决它，或者至少想出一些关于它的想法，然后你用二十分钟的时间陈述你的解决方案和/或回答他们的问题。为了防止作弊，四十分钟的考试时间是连续的，不允许从一个房间到另一个房间。因此，你需要从一个考场跑到另一个考场，尽可能多地利用这二十分钟的准备时间。
On Monday they examine you orally. They present you with a problem; you have twenty minutes to look at it and try to solve it or at least think up something to say about it, and then you present your solution and/or answer their questions for twenty minutes. To discourage cheating, the forty-minute periods are consecutive, with no time allowed to go from one room to the other. Thus you run from examination room to examination room, to have as much of the twenty minutes of preparation time as possible.
周二，你要展示你迄今为止的研究工作。这样他们就能评估你是否有能力“做研究”。
And on Tuesday, you present your research work to date. This enables them to evaluate whether you are able to "do research."
12 月 31 日
December 31
还有二十天。除夕夜。斯隆实验室里除了 Tung 先生和 Tung 太太外没有其他人。Tung 先生和 Tung 太太是一对住在走廊对面的中国夫妇，他们在电炉上烹饪着散发着恶臭的海藻。他们的除夕夜是在二月。
Twenty days to go. New Year's Eve. No one in the Sloan Lab except Mr. and Mrs. Tung, the Chinese couple across the hall with the foul-smelling seaweed they cooked on their hot plate. Their New Year's Eve was in February.
独自一人。这就是结局。靠自己。自己做。独自解决问题集。独自与牛顿、拉格朗日一起。独自与教科书的作者一起。模式识别，没有时间深入研究问题，只有时间从解决的解集中学习尽可能多的技巧。尝试解决问题；陷入困境。查看解集以获得提示。继续。再次陷入困境。再次查看解集。
Solo. This is how it ends. By yourself. Do it yourself. Plow through the problem sets alone. Alone with Newton, with Lagrange. Alone with the authors of the textbooks. Pattern recognition, no time to look deep into the problems, just time to pick up as many tricks from worked-out solution sets as possible. Try problem; get stuck. Look at solution set for hint. Continue. Get stuck again. Look at solution set again.
到了第二或第三道相同类型的问题时，模式就变得更加清晰了。然后你希望限定词的问题将包括你已经内化的技巧。
By the second or third of the same type of problem the pattern becomes clearer. And then you hope the problem on the qualifiers will include the trick you have internalized.
10:30 时，董先生和董太太也离开了；唯一剩下的噪音是玛丽鱼缸过滤器发出的响声，透过她办公室的锁着的门传来。在返回高级宿舍的路上，学院里空无一人。通常任何时候都挤满人的无尽走廊，在 319 步内都空无一人。其他走廊也是如此。只有书呆子中的书呆子才会在除夕夜 11:30 学习。
At 10:30 even Mr. and Mrs. Tung had left; the only noise left was the filter from Mary's fish tank loud through the locked door of her office. On the way back to Senior House the institute was empty. The infinite corridor, normally populated at all hours, was empty for all of its 319 paces. So was every other corridor. Only a nerd's nerd studies at 11:30 on New Year's Eve.
1984 年。更多动力学（林肯教授的课程，B+），加上静力学复习（希尔教授，B++，班上最高的 B，不是 A）。我从一本书跳到另一本书，填补了概念上的空白。在静力学中，重量位于横梁上。在动力学中，重量上下移动。在系统动力学（大卫·米勒，海军人员的 A）中，重量上下移动，你称横梁为弹簧。同样的重量，同样的横梁。
1984. More Dynamics (Lincoln's class, B plus), plus review of Statics (Professor Hill, B plus plus, the highest B in the class, not an A). I skipped from book to book, closing the conceptual gaps. In Statics, the weight sits on the beam. In Dynamics, the weight moves up and down. In System Dynamics (David Miller, A with the navy guys), the weight moves up and down and you call the beam a spring. The same weight, the same beam.
1 月 2 日
January 2
《波士顿环球报》生活版头版的一篇带有幽默感的文章写道：“我们学会了努力追求和‘需要’我们自身价值的外在象征，而不是享受学习、取得成就和掌握知识的过程，而后者是人类更自然的满足感。”这就是麻省理工学院的精髓。成绩是价值的外在象征。客观、量化，就像 SAT 成绩、智商、薪水、银行存款、道琼斯平均指数、彩票号码一样。这一切都是骗人的。
The Globe article on the front of the Living section with the funnies in it said, "We learn to strive for and 'need' external symbols of our worth, instead of enjoying the process of learning, accomplishing, and mastering, which is a more natural human gratification." That's MIT in a nutshell. The grades are the external symbols of worth. Objective, quantitative, like an SAT score, like an IQ, a salary, a bank balance, a Dow Jones average, a lottery number. It's all such a crock.
我开始学习和掌握更多的流体力学知识。这是资格考试的外部动机最后一次让我更深入地了解流体的行为。我更清楚了为什么薄荷派蒂的茶叶会流到杯子的中心。我想了解的烟囱羽流不仅有锅炉排气，还有两个反向旋转的涡流。它呈现出化学方程式和矢量微积分的抽象美。
I set out to learn and master more of Fluid Mechanics. This was the last time the external motivation of the qualifying examinations would make me internalize more deeply how fluids behaved. It became clearer to me why Peppermint Patty's tea leaves went to the center of the cup. The smokestack plume I'd wanted to understand had not only boiler exhaust but two counterrotating vortices. It took on the abstract beauty of chemical equations and vector calculus.
1 月 3 日至 5 日
January 3-5
更多流体和一些固体。这都是物理学，平衡的力、平衡的力矩、连续性。日常生活中的物理学。建筑物边缘的涡流。卡车驶过时桥梁摇晃。摩天大楼被风吹得摇摇欲坠。当施加的力太大时，固体会断裂；流体会继续变形，以适应力。
More Fluids, and some Solids. It was all physics underneath, balanced forces, balanced moments, continuity. The physics of everyday life. Vortices at the edge of buildings. Bridges shaking when trucks drive by. Skyscrapers buffeted by the wind. A solid breaks when the force applied is too big; a fluid continues to deform, to adjust to the force.
我在无尽的走廊上遇见了希尔教授。
I met Professor Hill on the infinite corridor.
“是的，我非常享受在 50 年代参加考试时一次性复习所有内容的机会，”他说。“你会发现，仅仅三四个方程就能控制大量现象。”
"Yes, I really enjoyed the opportunity to review everything at once, back in the '50s when I took the exams," he said. "You'll find that just three or four equations govern a heck of a lot of phenomena."
1 月 6 日
January 6
在切特家里开派对。切特在莱克星顿的 Cape 有三间卧室，里面没有太多家具。也许他一住上终身住宅，就会结婚，然后养育孩子，摆满家具。
Party at Chet's house. Chet didn't have a lot of furniture in his three-bedroom Cape in Lexington. Perhaps he would marry and fill it with kids and furniture once he was tenured.
在一圈的谈话中，切特说：“这些限定词可以很好地衡量你与同龄人相比的知识水平，但并不是一个好的绝对衡量标准。很多事情都发生在结果会议上，教授们聚在一起，为学生争吵或拒绝争吵。它应该是完全客观的、定量的，但其中有相当多的主观评价。”
In a circle of conversation, Chet said, "The qualifiers are a good measurement of your knowledge relative to your peers, but they're not a good absolute measure. A lot happens at the results meeting, when the professors get together and duke it out or decline to duke it out for their students. It's supposed to be entirely objective, quantitative, but there is a fair amount of subjective evaluation that goes into it."
“那么，切特，你会在那次会议上为我争取利益吗？”我问道。
"So, Chet, are you going to fight for me at that meeting?" I asked.
“那天我将在底特律发表一篇论文。”
"I'll be giving a paper in Detroit that day."
从派对回来的路上，本的车里，收音机里播放着布伦达·李的歌。她唱道：“Breeaakk it ... to me gintleeee ...”
On the way back from the party, in Ben's car, the radio played Brenda Lee. She sang, "Breeaakk it ... to me gintleeee ..."
1 月 7 日
January 7
抑郁。盯着窗外。无法正常运作。无法思考。这是这个领域的必然结果。他们像捡螺栓一样把你捡起来，从各个角度检查你的缺陷。如果你表现良好，他们会把你和其他高价螺栓一起扔进垃圾箱。如果你不符合规格，他们会把你扔进废料堆。无论哪种情况，他们都不会把你当人看待。
Depression. Staring out the window. Inability to function. Inability to think. It comes with this territory. They pick you up like a bolt, examine you for flaws from all angles. If you are good, they put you in the bin with all the other high-priced bolts. If you don't meet the specs, they throw you in the scrap heap. In either case, they don't treat you like a human being.
1 月 8 日
January 8
骑自行车逃走。再次来到林肯，萨德伯里。英格兰般的灰色、白雪皑皑、寒冷而死寂的风景。我通过膝盖像活塞一样上下移动，为自行车输入一个正弦力函数；我的小腿是连接双缸发动机轴的连杆。我的体重储存了能量，并将交替输入转换为直接输出，时速 15 英里。
Bicycle ride to escape. Lincoln again, Sudbury. England-like gray, snowy, wintry dead landscapes. I input a sinusoidal forcing function to the bicycle through my knees going up and down like pistons; my lower legs were connecting rods to the shaft on the two-cylinder engine. My weight stored the energy and converted the alternating input into a direct output, fifteen miles per hour.
沿途加油站的汽水贩卖机让我魂牵梦绕。两周后，我就能成为“Dr. Pepper”了。
The soda machines at the gas stations along the route haunted me. In two weeks I'd have my shot at being "Dr. Pepper."
1 月 9 日
January 9
本和我一起复习控制课。本成为了一名明星学生，成绩全优。通常情况下，没有人会一起复习资格考试，因为你们中的一个可能最终会教另一个，如果你这样做，那么你将处于劣势，你会浪费一些时间，而这些时间可能会让你对其中一项考试有所了解。但这条规则也有一些例外。
Ben and I got together to review Controls. Ben was turning out to be a star student, what with straight A's and all. Normally no one studies together for the qualifiers, because one of you probably will end up teaching the other and if you do that then you'll be at a disadvantage and you'll have wasted some time that might have given you some insight that would help on one of the tests. But there were a few exceptions to this rule.
“我告诉你，”本说，“自从我被录取，他们在录取通知书里附上了之前预选赛的样题包，我就一直在想着它们。现在已经两年多了，离预选赛只有十天了。这真是难以置信。我最近睡眠不好，每天必须在厕所里花一个小时。我的意思是，如果我考不上，我会一辈子都受不了，就像每次我打开电视或拿起《时代》杂志，就会看到麻省理工学院的某个人对某件事发表权威意见，我就会对自己说，‘如果我再努力一点，我也能考上。’”
"I tell you," Ben said, "ever since I was accepted here and they included in the acceptance letter the packet of sample questions from the previous qualifiers, I've been thinking about them. It's been over two years now and they're only ten days away. It's hard to believe. I haven't been sleeping well recently, and I must spend an hour on the john every day. I mean, if I don't make it, it'll haunt me for the rest of my life, like every time I turn on the TV set or pick up Time magazine there'll be some guy from MIT giving his authoritative opinion on something and I'll say to myself, 'That could have been me if I'd just worked harder.' "
T减十
T minus ten
歌曲在我心中回荡。“我不在乎他们对我做什么，他们不能夺走我的尊严”，还有“努力做到 / 不再假装，这一次我要成功。”我们的文化真是太棒了。
Songs ran through me. "I don't care what they do to me, they can't take away my dignity," and "Makin' it / No more fakin' it, this time in life I'm makin' it." What a culture we have.
在餐厅，我和卡洛斯·洛佩兹以及传热实验室足球队剩下的几名队员坐在一起，过去两年来，我们每三四个月在走廊上聊十分钟，与这些人保持着亲密的友谊。我告诉他们那首关于我的尊严的歌。
At the cafeteria, I sat with Carlos Lopez and some of the other remaining guys from the Heat Transfer lab soccer team, the guys I'd maintained close friendships with through our ten minute hallway chats every three or four months for the past two years. I told them about the song line about my dignity.
“你错了，”卡洛斯说。“你的尊严首先就被剥夺了。这有点像《激流四勇士》中一个男人被强奸的场景，乡巴佬说，‘尖叫吧，小伙子，像猪一样尖叫。’这是教授最后一次对你施加影响了。考试结束后，不管通过与否，你都是你自己。他们知道这一点，所以他们想抓住你。”
"You're wrong about that," Carlos said. "Your dignity is the first thing that goes. It's sort of like that scene in Deliverance where the guy's getting raped and the redneck says, 'Squeal boy; squeal like a pig.' This is the last time the professors have any power over you. After the exams, pass or fail, you're your own person. They know that, so they want to nail you."
哦，得了吧，事情不会那么糟糕。
Oh, come on, it can't be that bad.
“顺便问一下，”卡洛斯继续说道。“你带护膝了吗？”
'By the way," Carlos continued. "You got your kneepads?"
我说：“是的，我需要他们，所以我可以跪在他们面前乞求，‘求求你，让我加入你的俱乐部。我希望人们向我寻求建议，并认为我是世界上最聪明的人之一……尽管我不是。’”
I said, "Yeah, I'll need them so I can kneel before them and beg them, 'Please, please, let me be in your club. I want people to seek advice from me and think I'm one of the smartest people in the world ... even though I'm not.' "
“嘿，我喜欢这个，”卡洛斯说。“尤其是那个妙语。”
"Hey, I like that," Carlos said. "Especially the punch line."
T减九
T minus nine
尼克在车床旁。“是的，佩帕，我希望你能成功。也许你会在这里待一辈子。很多人都会这样。他们不断通过考试，不知不觉中，就拿到了终身教职。这些教授的生活很好。有稳定的底薪，每周工作四天，一年工作八个月，其余时间开公司、咨询和写书。他们有自己的主见。我明白你为什么想成为他们那样的人。顺便问一句，我告诉你他们要解雇我了吗？”
Nick was at the lathe. "Yeah, Peppah, I hope you make it. Maybe you'll be a lifer here. It happens to a lot of people. They keep passing the tests and before you know it, boom, they've got tenure. They've got a good life, those professors. Secure base pay, fourday-a-week job, eight months a year, the rest of the time starting their companies and consulting and writing their books. They're their own men. I can see why you want to try to be like them. By the way, did I tell you they're lettin' me go?"
“太好了，尼克。他们要让你去哪儿？”
"That's great, Nick. Where are they letting you go?"
“不，你不明白。他们要解雇我。”
"No, you don't understand. They're layin' me off."
“他们要解雇你吗？”
"They're giving you the axe?"
“现在是解雇通知书时间。就像沃特敦轮胎厂的解雇通知书一样。不过，我没什么可抱怨的。我在这里已经二十年了，养老金可以让我和我的宝贝留在阿灵顿的家里。不过，我每周会来一两天，有点像你所说的......顾问。”
"It's pink slip time. Just like from the tire plant in Watertown. I can't complain, though. I been here twenty years and the pen- sion'll keep me an' my honey bear in the house in Ahlington. I'll come in one or two days a week, though, sort of like a whadaya call ... consultant."
“哎呀，尼克，没有你，这个地方就没有任何乐趣了，”我说。
"Gee, Nick, the place just wouldn't be any fun without you," I said.
“别担心，船长。我们会一直有快速压缩机的。”
"Don't worry, Cap'n. We'll always have the rapid compression machine."
T减八
T minus eight
哲学时间。忘记通过或失败；学习我能学到的东西。向控制组的教授询问稳定性。动力学（林肯，课程二九四）意义上的稳定性会告诉你一些事情，例如你的车是否会在转弯时过快翻车。控制意义上的稳定性（二十四）会告诉你一些事情，例如你正在研究的机器人手臂是否会来回弹跳并自行断裂。
Philosophy time. Forget passing or failing; learn what I can learn. Ask professor in controls group about Stability. Stability in the Dynamics (Lincoln, course two nine four) sense tells you things like whether or not your car will flip over going around a turn too fast. Stability in the Controls sense (two fourteen) tells you things like whether the robot arm you're working on will bounce back and forth and break itself apart.
由于控制课被称为“系统动力学和控制”，而动力学课被称为“动力学”，所以我认为稳定性的两种不同含义之间一定存在联系。这位匿名终身教授犹豫不决，事实上他并不知道。他以“我故意回避。我认为你应该自己解决这些问题”来逃避。
Since the Controls class was called "System Dynamics and Controls" and the Dynamics class was called "Dynamics," I thought there must be a connection between the two different meanings of stability. The anonymous tenured professor hemmed and hawwed and in fact he didn't know. He escaped with "I'm deliberately being evasive. I think you should work these things out for yourself."
我不满意。我敲开了克兰德尔教授的门。他是麻省理工学院 10% 的精英教授之一，正是他们为该学院赢得了声誉。他打着领结，戴着半框眼镜，穿着西装，他的课程“工程分析方法”是麻省理工学院的经典课程。冯·卡门研究所的一位土耳其朋友首先向我介绍了他。
I wasn't satisfied. I knocked on Professor Crandall's door. He was one of the 10 percent creme de la creme of MIT professors who give the institute its reputation. He wore a bow tie and half glasses and a suit, and his course, Methods in Engineering Analysis, was an MIT classic. A Turkish friend at the von Karman institute had first told me about him.
我重复了我的问题。“我想看看 202（系统动力学）意义上的稳定性和 294（动力学）意义上的稳定性之间的联系。”
I repeated my question. "I'd like to see the connection between stability in the two oh two (System Dynamics) sense and in the two nine four (Dynamics) sense."
“是的，”他轻声而谨慎地说道。“这是思想的连续性。你看，如果你画出你的汽车在转弯时的轨迹，如果你观察它在转弯时如何稍微偏离平衡位置，你就会得到一个二阶微分方程，它是如何回到平衡位置的。这个方程中的系数决定了系统的固有频率和阻尼，这些系数与你在设计控制器时使用的系数相同，例如，它可以防止汽车翻车。”
"Yes," he said softly, deliberately. "It's a continuum of thought. You see, if you draw your automobile going around a turn, and if you look at moving it away from its equilibrium position by a small amount as it goes around that curve, you'll arrive at a second-order differential equation for how it will return to that equilibrium position. The coefficients in that equation determine the natural frequency and damping of the system, and those are the same coefficients you use when designing a controller to, for example, prevent the vehicle from flipping over."
他从办公桌上放废纸的抽屉里抽出一张废纸，画出相似之处。我问了其他问题，他提出了至少两种看待每个问题的方法。
He pulled a piece of scrap paper from the desk drawer reserved for scrap paper and sketched the similarities. I asked other questions, and he presented at least two ways of looking at each.
他证实了我的猜测：问题就像是一个透明立方体内的机器。当你看立方体的一侧时，你会看到机器的某些部分。但要彻底理解它，你必须拿起立方体，从上面、下面、各个角度查看它，摇晃它以查看其中的连接。
He confirmed my hunch that a problem is like a machine inside a clear cube. When you look at one side of the cube you see what some of the machine looks like. But to understand it thoroughly, you have to pick up the cube and look at it from above, below, from all sides, shake it to see the connections.
T 减七并计数
T minus seven and counting
暴风雪。大片雪花从 Atkinson 302 卧室的窗户飘出。我看了看第一学期的《流体》电影指南。每一片雪花都会影响到其他每一片雪花。旋涡在树周围刻出马蹄形图案；旋涡从建筑物的角落脱落。Howard Gelman 穿着运动短裤、T 恤、黑色袜子和高帮 Keds 鞋。
Snowstorm. Large flakes out the window from Atkinson 302's bedroom. I looked at the guidebook to the Fluids films from the first term. Every snowflake affects every other snowflake. Vortices carved horseshoes around trees; vortices shed off comers of buildings. Howard Gelman wore gym shorts, a T-shirt, black socks, and high-top Keds.
T减六
T minus six
曾明是凯克教授的一位来自中国的学生，他和我一起吃了午饭。他也在为预选赛做准备。在穿过马萨诸塞大道的路上，曾明遇到了他的一位朋友。曾明说：“我是麻省理工学院第一位来自中国的博士。如果我通过了预选赛，我就是第 30 或第 35 名。”
Ming Tsang, Professor Keck's student from the People's Republic of China, ate lunch with me. He was studying for the qualifiers, too. On the way across Mass. Ave., Ming met one of his friends. "Disa man first Ph.D. at MIT from PRC," Ming said. "Ifah I pass qualifiers, I be number 30, 35."
“哎呀，你们每个人都应该有一件印有自己号码的 T 恤，”我说。他们笑了。
"Gee, you guys should each have a T-shirt with your number on it," I said. They laughed.
明说：“你明天来参加我们的学习小组吗？我和一些朋友在 3-249 见面，晚上 7 点。”
Ming said, "You come to our study group tomorrow? I meet with some friends at 3-249, 7:00 P.M."
“听起来不错，”我说。
"Sounds good," I said.
这些人比 20 亿中国人都聪明，我要与他们竞争。我只希望他们阅读能力差，这会拖慢他们的速度。
These guys are smarter than 2 billion Chinese and I'm going to be competing against them. I just hope they have poor reading skills that will slow them down.
T 减五
T minus five
和明一起参加复习课的还有另外两个人。一个将在本月参加考试，另一个将在 5 月参加考试。他们俩都看起来很担心。如果我失败了，我会找一份年薪 3 万美元左右的工作，开始积累资产。如果他们也失败了，他们就会乘坐第一架 747 飞机返回世界上最大的监狱。
There were two others at the review session with Ming. One would take the exams this month, the other in May. They both looked worried. If I failed, I'd find a job at about 30 grand a year and begin to build up equity. If they failed they'd be on the first 747 back to the world's largest prison.
其中一个担心的人，王先生说：“我希望考试快点结束。从圣诞节前两周开始，我已经连续学习了五周。每天学习十二个小时。我把《流体》、《热学》、《控制》、《力学》后面的每一道题都做了。现在我开始复习阅读了。”
One of the worried ones, Mr. Wang, said, "I want exam be over. I be study five week straight now, since two weeks before Christmas. Twelve hours every day. I did every problem in back of Fluid book, Thermo book, Control book, Mechanics books. Now I start review reading."
所以这就是成功所需要的。我敢打赌这些人不会失去动力或陷入沮丧。他们通过努力克服困难。
So that's what it takes. I bet these guys don't have motivational lapses or get depressed. They beat it with work.
明从背包里拿出一叠厚约一英寸的试卷。这些都是以前资格考试的题目，附有答案，比夏洛特·埃文斯给我的那堆样题要好得多。完全合法；中国网络提供了很好的文件。明主持了会议；我们四个人围坐在一张牌桌旁。
Ming pulled out a one-inch stack of papers from his backpack. They were problems from previous qualifying exams, with solutions, above and beyond the packet of sample problems Charlotte Evans had given to me. Perfectly legal; the China network had produced good files. Ming ran the session; the four of us sat around a card table.
“这道题怎么解？”明说着把第一个题目放到了桌子中央。这是汽车的气门和摇臂总成，组装。
"How 'bou dissa one?" Ming said as he put the first problem on the center of the table. It was a car's valve and rocker-arm assembly, assembelee assembelee.
王先生说：“我认为我们必须对两个自由度系统进行拉格朗日公式化。”其他人都表示同意，我又有什么资格反对呢？
"I tinka we have to do Lagrangian formulation for two degree of freedom system," Mr. Wang said. The others agreed and who was I to disagree?
下一个问题。再次快速浏览问题，讨论几句，并就所涉及的原理做出决定。砰砰砰，模式继续，我们在不到一个小时内完成了四十道问题的堆积。如果这些家伙学会制造汽车和录像机，上帝保佑我们。
Next problem. Again a quick look at the problem, a few words of discussion, and a decision on the principle involved. Boom boom boom the pattern continued, and we finished the stack of forty problems in less than an hour. Lord help us if these guys ever learn to build cars and VCRs.
第三位同学袁先生建议道：“莱斯，你先说五分钟，就当是口语考试吧，说五分钟后我们要说点什么。”
Mr. Yuen, the third one, suggested, "Les try dissa one for five minutes; pretend it's oral exam. Say we have to say something after five minutes."
问题是设计一个波浪形的坡道，让啤酒桶滚下来。它不能是直的坡道，因为啤酒桶到达底部时会滑得太快。坡道的设计应该考虑什么？袁先生打电话给我。“你觉得呢？”
The problem was to design a wavy ramp for beer barrels to roll down. It couldn't be a straight ramp because the barrels would go too fast by the time they reached the bottom. What things should be considered in the design of the ramp? Mr. Yuen called on me. "Whatta you think?"
“在我看来，关键在于弄清楚坡道上应该装多少个波纹。这将影响你可以从坡道上送下的桶的数量，并会告诉你桶在下落过程中是否会相互碰撞。波纹的设计应使啤酒桶推动结构的频率远离结构的共振频率，”我说。
"It looks to me as if the point is to figure out how many ripples to put in the ramp. That will affect the number of barrels you can send down the ramp, and it'll tell you whether or not the barrels will run into each other on the way down. The ripples should be designed so that the frequency of the beer barrels pushing on the structure is far away from the resonant frequency of the structure," I said.
“你还需要考虑啤酒在桶内旋转的影响，”袁先生说。休息前，我们进一步讨论了这个问题。
"And you need to consider effect of beer rotating in the barrel," Mr. Yuen said. We discussed it further before breaking.
我们离开房间时，明鼓励了我。他说：“我想你会通过的。”
As we left the room, Ming encouraged me. He said, "I tinka you pass."
T减四
T minus four
邝先生是韩国现代公司的一名造船工程师，我曾和他一起上希尔教授的静力学课，由于韩国纸张稀缺，他把纸的正反面都写满了每一寸。他正在学生中心图书馆里备考海洋工程资格考试。
Kwang, the Korean shipbuilding engineer from Hyundai with whom I'd studied in Professor Hill's Statics class, who wrote on every square inch of paper, front and back, because paper is scarce in Korea, was in the student center library. He was preparing for the qualifiers in ocean engineering.
“现在我不在乎会发生什么，”他说。“只要我能保持健康就行。”
"At this point I don't care what happens," he said. "Just as long as I keep my health."
负责对我进行口试的教授们在学院里走来走去。他们以前就在那里——我从系研讨会、教职工会议和其他学生讲的故事中认出了他们。但现在我好像是一名间谍，我有一张被指派杀死我的俄罗斯间谍的照片，我发现了他，但他还不知道我是谁。偏执症深深地袭来。它会悄悄潜入你的生活。
Professors who would be examining me in the orals walked around the institute. They were there before-I recognized them from the department seminars and the faculty meetings and the stories I'd heard from the other students. But now it was as if I were a spy and I had a photo of the Russian spy who was assigned to kill me and I'd spotted him but he didn't know who I was yet. Paranoia strikes deep. Into your life it will creep.
我又找杨彻谈话，告诉他我心里想的那些歌。
I talked to Chet Yeung again. I told him about the songs I'd been thinking of.
他说：“你可以试试‘做不可能的梦’。不，说真的，我知道你正在经历什么。当我参加那些考试时，我经常发现自己一次盯着窗外看几个小时，想知道我为什么要这样做。”
He said, "You might try 'To Dream the Impossible Dream.' No, seriously, though, I know what you're going through. When I went through those examinations I often found myself staring out the window for hours at a time, wondering why I put myself through it."
T减三
T minus three
高思想通量（单位面积的流量）。我来到麻省理工学院，想看看我周围的物理原理，今天一切都向我大声喊出它的原理：汽车中的质量、弹簧和减震器、建筑物中脚下弯曲的梁、烟囱中的更多涡流以及喷气式飞机的尾迹和建筑物的角落。我不是在房间里学习，而是在一个有虚线的盒子里学习，质量和能量从虚线中进入，从虚线中流出。我想让这些想法井然有序；我想根据需要关闭和打开分析；但它卡在打开的位置。
High idea flux (flow per unit area). I came to MIT wanting to see the physical principles around me, and today everything shouted its principle out at me: masses and springs and dampers in cars, beams bending underfoot in buildings, more vortices in smokestacks and jet airplane con-trails and corners of buildings. I studied not in a room, but in a box with dashed lines into which mass and energy entered and out of which it exited. I wanted to make the ideas orderly; I wanted to turn the analysis off and on on demand; but it was stuck in the on position.
我去音乐图书馆寻求庇护。贝多芬的《第七交响曲》。电机为转盘的旋转惯性提供了扭矩和角加速度。大和弦。小和弦，双簧管。音阶。音阶。优雅地排列和重复。有力。简单。鸡皮疙瘩。和弦。再次音阶。计算机永远不会制作这样的音乐。
I went to the music library to seek refuge. Beethoven's Seventh Symphony. The motor provided a torque and an angular acceleration to the rotational inertia of the turntable. Big chord. Small chord, oboe. Scale. Scale. A musical scale permuted and repeated elegantly. Powerfully. Simply. Goosebumps. Chord. Scale again. A computer will never make music like this.
T减2
T minus two
我接过夏洛特·埃文斯寄来的考试简报包：一个灰色的信封，白色标签上写着我的名字；里面有五张纸，上面写着我和另外二十九名参赛选手的姓名；他们的考试时间；口试的时间表很紧凑，这样我们就没有时间作弊；还有周二论文陈述的时间表。这些主题令人印象深刻：“机械手与世界动态相互作用的控制”、“恶劣环境下的腐蚀控制”、“为视障人士参与体育运动提供技术支持”、“快速压缩机中的柴油燃烧”。
I picked up the examination briefing packet from Charlotte Evans: a gray envelope with my name typed on the white label; five sheets of paper inside listing the names of the contestants, twenty-nine others and me; the times of their exams; the tight timetable matrix for the oral exams so we'd have no time to cheat; the schedule for the thesis presentations on Tuesday. The topics were impressive: "Control of Dynamic Interaction between a Manipulator and Its World," "Corrosion Control in a Hostile Environment," "Technological Support for the Involvement of the Sight-Impaired in Sports," "Diesel Combustion in a Rapid Compression Machine."
那天晚上我睡不着觉。漩涡、物质和弹簧相互作用，在我体内舞动——它们不会消失。但我并不觉得无聊。我在用笛卡尔坐标思考。我确实如此。
I couldn't sleep that night. The vortices and masses and springs interacted and danced through me-they wouldn't go away. But I wasn't bored. I was thinking in Cartesian coordinates. I was.
T减一
T minus one
前一天。最后一次检查我的笔记本。中午时分，我听从了切特的建议，锁好了我的书。我想让自己在考试前累到可以睡一觉，所以我在雪地里散步。在哈佛桥的中途，学院随处可见：贝聿铭（1940 年，建筑系）设计了约翰汉考克大厦。大卫·沃姆利（1962 年，机械工程系）是修复它的团队的一员。在查尔斯河的剑桥一侧，学院呈钢蓝灰色，后面是烟囱，前面是爱奥尼亚柱和新古典主义的权威，挑战我去达到它的标准——绝对的、无情的、无可争议的最佳。
The day before. One last pass through my notebooks. At noon, I took Chet's advice and locked away my books. I wanted to make myself tired enough to sleep before the exams so I took a walk in the snow. Halfway across the Harvard Bridge, the institute was everywhere: I. M. Pei ('40, Architecture) had designed the John Hancock Building. David Wormley ('62, Mechanical Engineering) was part of the team that fixed it. On the Cambridge side of the Charles, the institute, steel blue-gray, with smokestack plumes behind, Ionic columns and neoclassical authority ahead, challenged me to meet its standard-absolute, unforgiving, unassailably the best.
1 月 21 日
January 21
跳台滑雪运动员在起跳坡道上停下来并加速冲下。
The ski jumper pulled up over the lip and accelerated down the take-off ramp.
笔试在 3 号楼四楼，汤姆·布莱办公室对面的房间里进行。这是我为 270 设计项目建造的房间，四周的桌子上摆满了绘图桌、设备和设备目录。考试将于 9:00 准时开始；每个人都拿着十二支 2 号铅笔和装满课本和笔记本的牛奶箱就位。坐在我旁边的那个家伙背着一个背包，里面装着早餐和午餐，还有一个装满咖啡的保温瓶。
The written exam was on the fourth floor of Building 3, in the room across the hall from Tom Bligh's office. It was the room I'd built part of the two seventy design project in, with drafting tables and gears and gear catalogs on the tables around the perimeter. The exams were to start at 9:00 sharp; everyone was in place with twelve number two pencils and milk crates full of textbooks and notebooks. The guy sitting next to me had a backpack with breakfast and lunch in it, plus a thermos full of coffee.
监考员是两个去年通过资格审查的人。我觉得这很令人反感。他们就像南方种植园里的奴隶总管，被赋予特殊权利，以换取对其他奴隶的指挥权。他们给学院发了灰色信封，我们在 9:00:00 撕开了信封。
The proctors were two guys who'd passed the qualifiers the year before. I found this distasteful. It was as if they were the majordomos, the chief slaves in the southern plantations who were accorded special privileges in exchange for bossing around the other slaves. They handed out the institute gray envelopes and at 9:00:00 we ripped them open.
考试 1。系统动力学与控制。考试是一道气动控制题。气动控制使用各种气室来打开和关闭阀门。如果你以前见过，它们很简单。事实上，它们非常简单，以至于在麻省理工学院的两门控制课上，它们甚至都没有被提及。当然，如果你真正理解了控制的概念和基本原理，你就可以找出任何一种控制系统中的重点并解决问题。我记得卡洛斯对限定词说过的话：“让他们知道你所知道的一切。他们必须进行一场只有一个人能在一小时内完成的考试。否则，人们会在考试中途开始退学，这对那些较慢的学生不公平。把你知道的一切都写下来就行了。”
Exam 1. System Dynamics and Controls. The exam was a pneumatic control problem. Pneumatic control uses various air chambers to open and close valves. They are simple if you've seen them before. They're so simple, in fact, that in the two MIT Controls classes, they were not even mentioned. Of course, if you really understand the concepts of controls, the fundamentals, you can pick out the important points in any kind of control system and solve the problem. I remembered what Carlos said about the qualifiers: "Let them know everything you know. They have to give an exam that only one person will be able to finish in an hour. Otherwise, people would start to walk out midway through the test and that wouldn't be fair to the slower ones. Just put down everything you know."
我写道，对于所有组件，压力乘以面积等于力；我尝试通过支点和几何约束将组件联系起来。我勉强拿到了部分学分。我希望其他测试会更熟悉。
I wrote that pressure times area equals force for all the components; I tried to link the components by fulcrums and geometric constraints. I scraped for partial credit. I hoped the other tests would be more familiar.
考试 2。流体力学。第一学期我在 Shapiro 的课上得了 B。我在比利时学习流体一年。这应该很容易。“如图所示，一根软管水平排放到有孔的桶中。求将桶举起来所需的力
Exam 2. Fluid Mechanics. I got a B in Shapiro's class that first term. I spent a year studying fluids in Belgium. This should be easy. "A hose discharges horizontally to a bucket with a hole in it as shown in the figure. Find the force required to hold the bucket up
小菜一碟。至少十分之七。
Piece of cake. At least seven out of ten points.
午休时间从 11:00 到 1:00。坐在我旁边的那个家伙坐着复习，吃午餐，喝咖啡。我去了溜冰场。我的冰鞋下的压力足以融化一层薄薄的水膜，冰刀在上面滑动几乎没有摩擦。冰鞋和冰之间剩余的摩擦力提供了向心力，平衡了我身体保持直线的倾向，然后我转身了。
Lunch break from 11:00 to 1:00. The guy sitting next to me sat and reviewed and ate his lunch and drank his coffee. I went to the ice rink. The pressure under my skate was high enough to melt a thin film of water upon which the blade slid with nearly no friction. The remaining friction between the skate and the ice provided the center-seeking centripetal force to balance my body's tendency to keep going straight, and I turned.
考试 3。力学。“一根垂直杆受到冲量。求出使杆旋转一圈并落地所需的冲量的大小和方向。见图。”
Exam 3. Mechanics. "A vertical rod is given an impulse. Find the magnitude and direction of the impulse required to make the rod do one revolution and land on its end. See figure."
再说一遍，这与我在麻省理工学院参加的任何考试或课程中提到的内容都不一样。但我现在知道如何思考了，对吧？有点。我查阅了数据库，回到了高中物理课，回到了 4 号楼埃杰顿博士墙上的照片。如果你扔一个扳手，这个叫做质心的东西会沿着一条轨迹移动，就像它是一个棒球一样。扳手围绕着那个质心旋转。所以也许解决这个问题的诀窍是给杆一个足够大的踢力，使质心上升和下降所需的时间（就像是一个被抛向空中的棒球）等于冲量的侧向分量使杆旋转一圈所需的时间。将问题分解成两个独立的问题；最后解决一个共同的环节。
Again, this is nothing like anything that was ever mentioned in any test or any class I'd taken at MIT. But I know how to think now, right? Sort of. I polled the data base and went back to high school physics class and back to the photos on Doc Edgerton's wall in Building 4. If you throw a wrench, this thing called the center of mass goes along a trajectory as if it were a baseball. The wrench rotates around that center of mass. So maybe the trick to this problem is to give the rod a kick big enough so that the time required for the center of mass to rise and fall (as if it were a baseball being thrown up in the air) is equal to the time required for the sideways component of the impulse to make the rod do a revolution. Break the problem into two separate problems; solve for a common link at the end.
如果我通过了，我就可以和写这道题的教授一起研究这个问题，看看我当时离答案有多近，因为如果我通过了，我就会成为俱乐部的一员。如果我没通过，我永远也不会知道我当时是否离答案更近，因为评分试卷不会退还，因为 (1) 如果你决定起诉他们让你不及格，他们不想给你任何证据，(2) 麻省理工学院的研究生没有工会。估计分数为 6 分。
If I pass, I'll be able to go over the problem with the professor who wrote it and learn how close I was, because if I pass I'll be a member of the club. If I fail, I will never know whether I was even close, because the graded exams are not given back because (1) they don't want to give you any evidence if you decide to sue them for flunking you and (2) graduate students at MIT don't have a union. Estimated points, six.
考试 4。热力学。我想了解烟囱，这就是答案。“（A）计算烟囱出口速度，烟囱高 300 英尺，锥度为 2 度。入口条件是空气温度为 1200 华氏度，压力为 2 个大气压。做出任何合理的假设。”
Exam 4. Thermo. I wanted to understand the smokestack, and here it was. "(A) Calculate the exit velocity from a smokestack, 300 feet high, with a 2 degree taper. Inlet conditions are air at 1200 degrees F, at a pressure of 2 atmospheres. Make any reasonable assumptions."
又是一块小菜一碟。
Another piece of cake.
“（B）现在假设流量是稳定的或不随时间变化。”
"(B) Now assume that the flow is steady or does not vary with time."
等一下。我以为 A 部分是稳定的。Gyftopoulos 肯定写了这个测试。
Wait a minute. I assumed it was steady in part A. Gyftopoulos must have written this test.
重做部分 (A)。还剩 10 分钟。开始部分 (B)。预计分数为 7 分。
Redo part (A). Ten minutes left. Start part (B). Estimated points, seven.
沙特阿拉伯北欧滑雪队的跳台滑雪运动员从起跳坡道的尽头起跳。现在，他已经飞到了空中，整个周末他都漂浮着，希望自己不会向前摔倒，脸朝下着地。
Off the end of the take-off ramp the ski jumper from the Saudi Arabian Nordic team went. He was in the air now, for the weekend, floating, hoping he wouldn't fall forward and land on his face.
我和一位管家分享了这个比喻。
I shared the analogy with one of the majordomos.
他回答说：“我认为这更像是经历一场飓风的两面。今天你经历了一侧，现在你正处于周末的平静风眼中。周一和周二，你就会从另一侧出来。”
He answered, "I think it's more like going through both sides of a hurricane. You went through one side today, and now you're in the calm eye for the weekend. On Monday and Tuesday you'll come out the other side."
星期天下午。我问明周末过得怎么样。
Sunday afternoon. I asked Ming how his weekend was going.
“哦，还不错。我刚刚背完了口语考试的教材。”
"Oh, pretty good. I just finish memorizing textbooks for oral exam."
星期一早上
Monday morning
我穿着三件套西装和皮底鞋在楼梯上上下下练习。完美的路线是先从稍宽的地方开始，然后抓住栏杆的垂直部分，跑进去，在靠近内侧转弯，就像印地 500 那样。在测试之间节省的每一秒都可能是灵感的瞬间。
I did the practice runs in my three-piece suit and leather-soled shoes up and down the stairs. The perfect line was to start a little wide, then grab the vertical piece of the bannister as I ran in to take the turn close to the inside, like in the Indy 500. Any seconds saved in the movement from test to test might be the seconds of inspiration.
力学、流体、热力学课程进行得很顺利。Hill、Weare、Shapiro、Lincoln 和 Gyftopoulos 出人意料地彬彬有礼。
Mechanics, Fluids, Thermo went well. Hill, Weare, Shapiro, Lincoln, and Gyftopoulos were surprisingly civil.
接下来是控制。最后四十分钟。
And then there was Controls. The last forty minutes.
“当气体从大型储气罐进入腔室 a 时，如何设计反馈控制回路以使表面 x 以指定的恒定速度移动？不要假设不可压缩流。”
"How would you design a feedback control loop to make the surface x move at a specified constant speed, when gas is allowed to enter chamber a from a large reservoir? Do NOT assume incompressible flow."
经典的气球问题，但有一个变化。可压缩流。这将流体和热能引入到控制中。这使得问题变得更加困难。还有十七分钟准备我的演讲。对可压缩部分一无所知。你需要的是一个控制阀和一个运动传感器来告诉你物体移动的速度。
The good old balloon problem, but with a twist. Compressible flow. This brings Fluids and Thermo into Controls. This makes it doubly hard. Seventeen minutes left to prepare my presentation. No idea on the compressible part. What you need is a control valve and a motion transducer to tell you how fast the thing is moving.
这没什么问题，但由于气体是可压缩的，所以整个过程是高度非线性的，所以这个问题不符合他们教给我的控制框架。
This would be fine except the whole thing is highly nonlinear since the gas is compressible, so this problem doesn't fit within the framework of the Controls they've taught me.
准备潜水，船长。呼呼呼呼。呜嘎呜嘎。战斗状态。
Prepare to dive, Captain. Whoop whoop whoop whoop. Aooga Aooga. Battle stations.
我走进那间屋子，那里坐着三位肥胖的审判官。我成功地在学习期间没有大吃大喝；事实上，我瘦了几磅。如果他们能活那么久的话，这些人肯定能获得终身教职。
I walked into the room where the three fat Inquisitors sat in judgment. I'd succeeded in not porking out during my studying; I'd actually lost a few pounds. These guys were on their way to tenure, if they lived that long.
“把你的解决方案写在黑板上。”第一个人说。
"Write your solution on the board," the first one said.
这块黑板不是普通的挂在墙上的黑板，而是可以翻转的独立式黑板。我在上面写字时，它很不稳定。
The board was not a regular blackboard attached to a wall, but a freestanding type that you could flip over. It was unstable when I wrote on it.
“呃，我真的不知道如何解决压缩性问题。不过，我对不可压缩的情况有一个想法，”我说。
"Uh, I really don't know how to address the compressibility issue. I do have an idea for the incompressible case, though," I said.
“你指望我们给你加分吗？”
"Do you expect us to give you any points for that?"
“嗯，这会展示出我对这类问题的一些了解。”
"Well, it would show some of what I know about this type of problem."
“好的，请说。”
"Okay, go ahead."
我把问题和我记得的为格林的独立研究所做的推导过程画了个草图。当我写下符号和方程式时，黑板无情地摇晃着，越来越靠近地板。再靠近黑板底部，就只能用膝盖写字了。我犹豫了一会儿，然后站了起来。
I sketched the problem and what I remembered of the derivation I'd done for Greene's independent study. The blackboard flopped mercilessly as I wrote the symbols and equations, farther and farther down toward the floor. Any closer to the bottom of the board and the only way to write would be from my knees. I hesitated for a second and started to stand up.
“不。继续写下去。写到板子的底部，”第三位审判官说。跪下，小子。尖叫。像猪一样尖叫。
"No. Keep writing down there. Write to the bottom of the board," the third Inquisitor said. On your knees, boy. Squeal. Squeal like a pig.
我不需要你，伙计。我不需要你的认可才能让我完整。我站起来说：“不。我更喜欢站着。像个男人一样。”
I don't need you, pal. I don't need your approval to make me complete. I stood up and said, "No. I prefer to stand. Like a man."
周三下午晚些时候，我敲开了罗森诺的门。他带我去了办公室外走廊的长椅上。那里比较吵闹，因此也比较私密。
Late Wednesday afternoon I knocked on Rohsenow's door. He took me out to the bench in the hall outside his office. It was noisier there and therefore more private.
“坐下，”他说。他打开了写有每个人成绩的表格的剪贴板。“你的流体学成绩还不错，笔试 7 分，口试 6 分。你在热力学上得了两个 7 分，其他科目得了 6 分，一个 5 分，一个 3 分。你把所有这些加起来，再加上你的论文分数 13 分（满分 20 分），就是 60 分（满分 100 分）。现在看看当某人的分数在这个范围内时，我们看看分布情况。如果你有几次 10 分和几次 2 分，那么，我们可能会让你通过……”
"Have a seat," he said. He opened the clipboard with the chart with everyone's scores on it. "You didn't do all that badly in Fluids; 7 written, 6 oral. And you got two 7s in Thermo, and 6s, one 5 and one 3 in the other areas. You add it all up plus your thesis points of 13 out of 20 and it comes to 60 out of 100. Now see when somebody's score is in that range we look at the distribution. If you'd had a couple of 10s and a couple of 2s, well, we might have let you pass...."
“你能让我五月再试一次吗？”
"Will you let me try again in May?"
“好吧，对于你这种情况，我们会说，好吧，就把它当成一场球赛吧。”
"Well, in a case like yours, we say, well, let's call it a ballgame."
斯蒂芬妮在哪儿？阿里在哪儿？玛丽在哪儿？尼克在哪儿？我现在能跟谁说话？我能向谁哭诉？唯一的肩膀是冰冷的。
Where's Stephanie? Where's Ari? Where's Mary? Where's Nick? Who can I talk to now? Who can I cry to? The only shoulders are cold.
罗森诺继续说道：“我总是告诉处于你们这种情况的学生，要把这想象成你们经历了严格的申请程序，但却没有被选中。”
Rohsenow continued, "I always tell students in your position to think of it sort of as if you went through a rigorous application process and weren't selected."
“嗯。嗯。好的，先生。我得走了，先生。”
"Ummmm. Ummmm. Okay, sir. I have to go, sir."
1984 年 2 月 5 日
February 5, 1984
我把完成的论文放在切特的桌子上。提交论文是为了部分满足机械工程理学硕士学位的要求。
I put the completed thesis on Chet's desk. Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering.
“所以，”切特在封面上签名时说道，“你是一个幸存者。”
"So," Chet said as he signed the cover page, "you're a survivor."
章节
C H A P T E R
21
21
继续
教育
Continuing
Education
1775 年 4 月 19 日，时年 80 岁的塞缪尔·惠特莫尔在此地附近杀死了三名英国士兵。他被枪杀、被刺刀刺死、被殴打，然后被抛弃等死，但后来康复并活到了 98 岁
NEAR THIS SPOT SAMUEL WHITTEMORE THEN 80 YEARS OLD KILLED THREE BRITISH SOLDIERS APRIL 19, 1775 HE WAS SHOT, BAYONETED BEATEN AND LEFT FOR DEAD BUT RECOVERED AND LIVED TO BE 98 YEARS OF AGE
- 马萨诸塞州阿灵顿中心杰斐逊卡特故居附近的历史标记
-Historic Marker near the Jefferson Cutter house in Arlington Center, Massachusetts
休斯敦的斯伦贝谢公司没有给我提供工作，这也许也不错，因为 1990 年伊拉克人入侵科威特时，我可能会被困在科威特。而且，在我父亲生命的最后几年里，我可能见不到他那么多时间，我的母亲和姐妹们也都健在。
Schlumberger, the guys in Houston, didn't offer me a job, which may be just as well because I might have gotten stuck in Kuwait when the Iraqis rolled in in 1990. And I wouldn't have seen as much of my father in the last years of his life, or my mother or my sisters, who are alive and well.
另一方面，雷诺确实给我提供了一份工作。切特签署我的论文几个月后，他们就把我送到了巴黎，我很难拒绝他们。但在林肯骑自行车时，几个在路边卖柠檬水的孩子让我留在了美国。他们看起来太美国化了，太乐观了，太不存在了。
Renault, on the other hand, did offer me a job. They flew me to Paris a few months after Chet signed my thesis, and it was tough to turn them down. But a couple of kids selling lemonade by the side of the road during a bike ride in Lincoln kept me stateside. They just seemed so American, so optimistic, so nonexistential.
1984 年 12 月 31 日
December 31, 1984
在新英格兰西部的某个地方。这是我在外面世界的第一个工程项目。小型水力发电厂的施工现场一片忙碌。开发商的律师在现场为该厂的“基本完工”和 1984 年投资者的税收抵免表示祝福。在格罗顿的 Electric Boat 公司学习焊工照亮了寒冷的夜空。“BVVVVVT！BVVVVVT！”电弧声响起。我和我的技术员爬进潜艇般的发电机箱，用螺栓固定最后的控制硬件 - 轴背面的超速开关，用于防止发电机旋转过快，以及计数器，用于光学读取经过的齿轮齿的脉冲数并将该信息转换为转速。水已经流过“潜艇”外壳，“潜艇”螺旋桨充当涡轮机，通过轴与发电机相连。轴转动得非常慢，但扭矩可能会对生命和肢体造成严重伤害。我小心翼翼地将脉冲计数器拧入其安装支架，连接好线路，然后爬出集装箱。
Somewhere in western New England. My first engineering project in the outside world. The construction site of the small hydroelectric power plant is abuzz with activity. The developer's lawyer is on site to bless the "substantial completion" of the plant and the tax credit to the investors in calendar year 1984. The welders who learned their craft at Electric Boat in Groton light up the cold night sky. "BVVVVVT! BVVVVVT!" the arcs sound. My technician and I climb into the submarinelike generator container and bolt up the last pieces of control hardware-the over-speed switch on the back of the shaft that will keep the generator from turning too fast, and the counter that optically reads the number of pulses of the gear teeth passing by and translates that information into rotational speed. The water has already been allowed to flow around the 'submarine" housing and the "submarine's" propeller acts as the turbine connected by the shaft to the generator. The shaft turns ever so slowly, but the torque could do serious damage to life and limb. I carefully screw the pulse counter into its mounting bracket, make the wiring connection, and climb out of the container.
在开关室的顶部，首席咨询工程师通过发光二极管读数检查发电机的速度。当发电机转速达到每秒 60 次时，他将开关拉下，300 千瓦的发电厂将 25 千瓦的电力输送到电网。
Up top in the switchgear room, the lead consulting engineer checks the generator's speed on the light emitting diode readout. When it corresponds to 60 cycles per second, he pulls the switch downward, and the 300 kiloWatt plant pumps 25 kiloWatts into the electric grid.
当水压转化为电能时，整个团队——开发商、承包商、主要投资者——都鼓掌、聊天。几分钟就过去了。
The whole crew-the developer, the contractor, the main investor-applauds, and chats while the water pressure is transformed into electrical energy. A few minutes go by.
“好吧，这在法庭上应该成立，”律师说。你现在可以断开连接了。”
"Well, that should hold up in court," the lawyer says. You can disconnect it now."
这就是现实世界中事物运作的方式。
So this is the way things work in the real world.
1986 年 1 月 24 日
January 24, 1986
上午晚些时候。伊利诺伊州森林湖，一家体育用品店。在我精力充沛的青年时代，我曾为新英格兰爱国者队和芝加哥熊队之间的第 20 届超级碗比赛委托制作 T 恤。为了保本，我印制了两件 T 恤，每件一件，这样无论比赛结果如何，我都有东西可以卖。中场休息时，我乘坐人民快运从纽瓦克飞往芝加哥，比赛结束后，我在芝加哥呆了几天，试图把剩下的 T 恤卖掉。
Late morning. Lake Forest, Illinois, in a sporting goods shop. In an entrepreneurial venture of my exuberant youth, I commis sioned t-shirts for Super Bowl XX between the New England Patriots and the Chicago Bears. To hedge my bets, I printed two shirts-one each so that I would have something to sell whichever way the game went. At halftime I took a People's Express flight from Newark to Chicago, and have stayed in Chicago for a few days after the game to try to unload the remaining shirts.
可惜的是，熊队的球迷们不理解熊撕扯自由钟的形象。我不能完全责怪他们，因为自由钟毕竟在费城，而不是在新英格兰。但它是爱国主义的象征，因此是爱国者的象征，所以对我来说很合适。
Alas the Bears fans don't understand the imagery of a bear pulling apart the Liberty Bell. I can't totally blame them, since after all the Liberty Bell is in Philadelphia, not in New England. But it is a symbol of patriotism, therefore the Patriots, so it works for me.
上午 11:10，我正在向 Lake Forest 体育用品店的老板推销，这时电话响了。他接了起来。“你在开玩笑吧。他们认为他们中有人幸存下来吗？哦，天哪。好的，我去看看电视。”他挂断电话，对我说，“挑战者号航天飞机刚刚爆炸了。”原来是 O 形圈出了问题。O 形圈很重要。
At 11:10 A.M., in the middle of my sales pitch to the Lake Forest sporting goods proprietor, the phone rings. He picks it up. "You're kidding me. Do they think any of them survived? Oh Jeez. Okay, I'll check the TV." He hangs up and says to me, The Space Shuttle Challenger just blew up.' It turned out to be the O-rings. O-rings are important.
1987 年冬季
Winter 1987
在麻省理工学院时，我发现自己是多么愚蠢，这让我受到了创伤，这让我通过和普通人一起上夜校课程重建了自信。我报了波士顿北部伍本市彼得森蒸汽工程学院的一门课。我曾经听过美国宇航局前负责人的一次演讲。他建议听众中的年轻工程师们不断学习，上课，读书。这门课是空调维修和控制。麻省理工学院教的东西很普通，比如恒温器的工作原理、控制继电器的作用以及如何向空调系统添加制冷剂。
The trauma of discovering how stupid I was at MIT has caused me to rebuild my confidence by taking night school classes with regular people. I've enrolled in a class at the Peterson School of Steam Engineering in Woburn, just north of Boston. I heard a lecture once by a former head of NASA. He advised the young engineers in the audience to continually educate themselves, take classes, read. This class is in air conditioning servicing and controls. Mundane stuff that is far beneath MIT, like how a thermostat works, and what a control relay does, and how do you add refrigerant to an air conditioning system.
这位讲师是一名安装空调设备的承包商，他站在 20 多名机械师和我面前，说道：“如果你在这个领域做得很好，你早上就会迫不及待地起床。你会成为一名技术员。”他带着一种热爱工作、热爱独立的人的自豪感说着这句话。他是一个独立自主的人。有很多非常聪明的人从未上过大学，更不用说麻省理工学院了。
The instructor, a contractor who installs air conditioning equipment, gets up in front of the 20 or so mechanics plus myself and says, 'If you get good in this field, you won't be able to wait to get up in the morning. You'll become a technician.' He says it with the pride of a man who loves his work and loves his independence. He's his own man. There are a lot of very smart people who never went to college, never mind MIT.
在 80 年代末的一次工程会议上
At an engineering conference, late 80s
我工作的地方有几个工程师出去喝酒。我喝了第三杯姜汁汽水。其中一个男人喝多了，开始调戏团队中的一名女性。我该怎么办？我该怎么办，玛丽？
A few of the engineers where I work are out for drinks. I'm on my third ginger ale. One of the guys has had a few too many and starts hitting on the one woman in the group. What do I do? What do I do, Mary?
开个玩笑，缓和一下局势。“所以如果你想在性骚扰审判中找证人，你可以依靠我，”我对她说。“是的，我会去的。我会做笔记。”醉汉闭嘴了。
Make a joke, diffuse the situation. "So if you want a witness at the sexual harassment trial you can count on me," I say to her. "Yessiree I'll be there. I'm takin' notes." The drunk guy shuts up.
1993 年 7 月
July 1993
罗马尼亚布加勒斯特。我正在从事一份出色的咨询工作，审查前一年撰写的节能报告，评估之前报告的影响。我是三人团队的一员。这个项目来自我在一次能源工程会议上认识的一个人的推荐。我们认识一年后，这家伙的姐夫的竞选搭档需要一名能源顾问，他给我打了电话。
Bucharest, Romania. I'm working on an excellent consulting gig, reviewing energy conservation reports that were written the year before, evaluating the impact of the previous reports. I'm part of a three-person team. The project came about from a referral from a guy I met at an energy engineering conference. The guy's brother-in-law's running partner needed an energy consultant a year after we met, and he gave me a call.
我们的导游给我们讲了革命的故事。他们没有枪，也没有多少弹药。所以他们用磁带录下了爆炸声和枪声，并把它们贴在建筑物的窗户上。政府军队害怕了。革命者还接管了电视台。一旦他们掌握了人民的思想，他们就不会失败。”
Our guide tells us about the revolution. They didn't have guns, or much ammunition. So they made tape recordings of explosions and gunfire and placed them in the windows of the buildings. The government troops became afraid. The revolutionaries also took over the TV station. Once they had the thoughts of the people, they couldn't lose."
我们走进俄罗斯建造的发电厂和蒸汽发电站，总工程师热情地和我们握手，说：“我们等你们已经 48 年了。”
We walk into the Russian-built electric power and steam generating station. The chief engineer gives us all warm handshakes and says, "We've been waiting 48 years for you guys to show up."
1995 年 7 月
July 1995
高温天气。全球变暖可能真的存在。中西部城市的公寓里，老人正在闷热的空气中死去。我去参加一家大型城市住房管理局的能源顾问职位的面试。
A heat spell. Global warming may be real. Elderly people are dying in their steamy apartments in the cities of the midwest. I go in for the interview to be a large metropolitan housing authority's energy consultant.
他们问道：“那么现在你打算怎样节约能源呢？”
"So what would you do about energy savings now?" they ask.
“绝对没有，”我回答道，“尤其是对那些年老体弱的人来说，在这种天气里他们必须感到凉爽舒适。贫穷不应该是死罪。如果你不能为整栋楼都装空调，那就确保至少有一个地方让人们可以去降温。一年中剩下的时间里，还有很多其他省钱的机会。”
"Absolutely nothing," I answer. "Especially with the elderly and infirm, they've got to be cool and comfortable in this kind of weather. Being poor shouldn't be a capital offense. If you can't air-condition the whole building, make sure that there's at least some place where people can go to cool down. There'll be plenty of other opportunities for savings during the rest of the year."
1999 年春
Spring 1999
阳光明媚的下午，我乘坐通勤铁路纽伯里波特线。这是怀特爷爷每天往返贝弗利和波士顿的路线。我从未见过他，但他在火车上写了一篇小日记。火车右侧朝向里维尔、林恩、塞勒姆和贝弗利的景色可能和他那个时代没有太大不同。经过北贝弗利，进入温汉姆，风景变得美丽而具有英国风情，有连绵起伏的山丘、马场和庄园。
Riding on the Newburyport line of the commuter rail on a sunny afternoon. This is the line that Grandfather White rode daily between Beverly and Boston. I never met him, but he wrote a little journal on his train rides. The view on the right side of the train toward Revere, Lynn, Salem, and Beverly was probably not much different in his day. After North Beverly, and into Wenham, the scenery becomes beautiful and English, with rolling hills, horse farms, and stately homes.
“IP-swich！”列车员宣布。坐在我对面的女士不是环保主义者，也不是学者，只是个普通的工薪阶层，她对朋友说：“是的，几个月前我的女儿和女婿在奥地利差点被雪崩困住。这就是全球变暖。”
"IP-swich!" the conductor announces. The lady sitting across from me, not a greenie, not an academic, just a regular working stiff, says to her friend, "Yeah, my daughter and son-in-law almost got caught in those avalanches in Austria a couple of months ago. It's that global warming."
我下了火车，驱车 1.3 英里，来到我们 1940 年代的海角，欣赏季节性的水景，我的妻子伊丽莎白迎接了我。
I get off the train, drive the 1.3 miles to our 1940s cape with seasonal water views and am greeted by my wonderful wife Elizabeth.
我离开麻省理工学院已经十五年了。TRW 工厂呼啸而出的压缩空气已经成为了一段淡淡的记忆。这座建筑被拆除，为新建的生物大楼腾出空间。F&T 餐厅也早已不复存在，麻省理工学院的学生在肯德尔广场地铁站附近的美食广场吃午餐的次数与在 Lobdell 吃午餐的次数一样多。
Fifteen years have passed since I left MIT. The compressed air hissing out of the TRW plant is a faded memory. The building was torn down to make room for a new biology building. The F&T diner is long gone too, and as many MIT people eat their lunch at the food court by the Kendall Square T-stop as ever ate at Lobdell.
伤疤开始一点一点愈合。我偶尔还是会梦到他们给我第二次机会。有时我会幻想着申请塔夫茨大学或新罕布什尔大学的博士课程。也许每学期修一门课，每门都拿 A，十年后就能成为博士。
Little by little the scars are beginning to heal. I still have an occasional dream that they're giving me a second shot at the qualifiers. Sometimes I daydream about applying to the doctoral program at Tufts or at UNH. Maybe do one course a term, get an A in each one, and in ten years be a Ph.D.
在经历了水力发电的经历之后，在挑战者号灾难发生之前，我开始在一家“能源服务公司”担任合同顾问。这是一段很好的经历。我学会了在锅炉房里走动，学会了如何穿过墙壁跟踪管道、风管和电线，学会了空调风扇、泵和控制阀是什么样子的。
After the hydroelectric experience and before the Challenger disaster I started working at an "energy service company" as a contract consultant. It was good experience. I learned my way around a boiler room, learned how to follow pipes, ducts, and electric lines through walls, learned what an air conditioning fan and a pump and a control valve look like.
能源服务公司的工作不错，但由于我是合同工，公司似乎没有动力投资我。1986 年春天，他们让我在罗德岛大学 (URI) 宿舍安装了几百个“节水器”，以减少淋浴间的水流量，这让我意识到是时候离开了。我比水管工还便宜。
The work with the energy service company was good, but since I was a contract worker it seemed that the company had no incentive to invest in me. The thing that made me realize it was time to go in the spring of 1986 was when they had me install several hundred "water widgets" that reduced the flow in the showers at the dorms at the University of Rhode Island (URI). I was cheaper than a plumber.
切尔诺贝利核事故发生当天，我在 URI 的走廊里数着白炽灯泡。这些灯泡将被紧凑型荧光灯取代，这样可以节省大约 70% 的用电量，同时提供相同的光量。当我在电视上看到勇敢的苏联消防员笨拙地试图扑灭失控的原子时，我觉得自己在能源问题上选择了正确的一方。
I was counting incandescent light bulbs in a hallway at URI on the day of the Chernobyl nuclear accident. The bulbs were to be replaced by compact fluorescent bulbs, that would produce about 70 percent savings in electric use, while giving the same amount of light. As I watched on TV the brave Soviet firefighters lamely try to douse the out-of-control atoms, I felt like I'd picked the right side of the energy issue.
在那家公司，一位猎头把我“安排”到了波士顿市中心的一家小型能源咨询公司。这家公司是由两名哈佛学生在上法语课时创办的。
From that company a headhunter "placed" me at a small energy consulting firm in downtown Boston. It had been founded by two Harvard students during French class.
我在这家咨询公司工作了六年，直到 1992 年 6 月。在电力放松管制之前，这些公司正处于繁荣时期，电力公司大把花钱让监管机构满意，并推迟建造新发电厂的需要。公司从 12 名员工发展到 80 名员工，而我也步步高升。但我对那里的老板从不满意，因为一旦你为 John B. Heywood 和 Chet Yeung 这样的老板工作过，就很难再为别人工作了。
I worked at the consulting firm for six years, until June 1992. It was a boom time for such firms, before electric deregulation, and the electric utilities were spending money hand over fist to keep the regulators happy and to defer the need to build new power plants. The firm grew from 12 employees to 80, and I rose up the corporate ladder. I was never satisfied with my bosses there though, because once you've worked for the likes of John B. Heywood and Chet Yeung, it's hard to work for anyone else.
有两件事让我确信是时候自己出去闯荡了。首先，1992 年冬春两季，公司任命我为佛蒙特州伯灵顿分公司的经理。当时只有我和一位来自该地区即将退休的工程师。我是他的老板。我不再被束缚，不再相信我写的所有东西都必须由 8 个不同的人阅读、检查、修改和校对。
Two events convinced me that it was time to go out on my own. First, the company made me a branch office manager in Burlington, Vermont, in the winter and spring of 1992. It was just me and an about-to-retire engineer from the area. I was his boss. I was out of the cocoon where I had been made to believe that everything I produced had to be read, checked, modified, and proofread by eight different people.
那里的主要电力公司客户要求进行与空气压缩机相关的分析。不到一小时，我就用 WordPerfect for DOS 在一台旧的 NEC 286 上打出了一份不超过一页半的摘要备忘录，并将其传真给他们。他们很喜欢它，并在之后的几个月里将其称为典范。
The primary electric utility client up there asked for an analysis relating to air compressors. In less than an hour I typed up a summary memo, no longer than a page and a half, on an old NEC 286 using WordPerfect for DOS, and faxed it to them. They loved it, and referred to it as a model for months afterward.
第二项活动是在 Sugarbush 滑雪胜地滑水。Sugarbush 距离伯灵顿不到一小时车程，周末我经常去那里。升降机操作员和造雪机操作员在滑雪场底部用雪筑起水坝，然后造出一个池塘。你从池塘上方几百英尺的地方开始，向池塘滑雪，在从雪地滑雪者变成滑水者的过程中努力保持平衡。我想，如果我能做到这一点，那么——不管是沉没还是滑水——我都会辞去工作，独自出去。
The second event was the pond-skimming at the Sugarbush Ski Resort. Sugarbush is less than an hour from Burlington, and I frequented it on weekends. The lift operators and snow-making machinery operators build a dam out of snow at the bottom of the ski hill and make a pond. You start a few hundred feet above the pond, ski toward it, and try to keep your balance as you go from snow skier to water skier. If I can get myself to do this, I thought, then-sink or skim-I'll quit my job to go out on my own.
我滑行了大约 40 英尺，然后向前摇晃，然后向后摇晃，最后在 100 英尺深的池塘里摔倒了大约 60 英尺。不过，我做得很优雅，在比赛中获得了第四名，并赢得了一件漂亮的绿色波兰春天运动衫。我希望有一天能减掉足够的体重，再次穿上它。
I skimmed about 40 feet, then rocked forward, then back, and then fell flat on my face about 60 feet down the 100 foot pond. However, I did it gracefully enough to come in fourth in the competition, and I won an attractive green Poland Spring sweatshirt. I'm hoping someday to lose enough weight to fit in it again.
我向波士顿咨询公司递交了辞呈，最后和解了。起初，自由职业的感觉就像我想象中的蹦极自由落体一样。我做这个是为了什么？但后来一个项目来了，然后又来了另一个，现在八年半过去了，电话不响的时候我比电话响的时候更开心。这样我就可以减少积压的工作了。
I gave my notice to the Boston consulting firm, and I left on good terms. At first being self-employed felt like what I imagined the freefall part of bungee jumping to be like. What am I doing this for? But then a project came in, and then another, and now eight and a half years later I'm happier when the phone doesn't ring than when it does. That way I can work down my backlog.
在自由职业的自由落体阶段，我进行了所谓的“个人生活改造”。我彻底清理了剑桥的受租金管制的单间公寓。我聘请了一位组织顾问，将我的工作文件整理成带有标签的悬挂文件，并开始核对我的支票簿。我妈妈告诉我，如果你建好鸟巢，小画眉鸟就会到来。”
During the free-fall phase of self-employment, I undertook what I refer to as my "personal life makeover." I thoroughly cleaned my rent-controlled Cambridge studio apartment. I hired an organizational consultant, organized my work files into hanging files with tabs, and started balancing my checkbook. My mother told me that if you build the nest, the little thrush will arrive."
我的咨询项目包括偶尔的照明调查、设置 Lotus 或 Excel 电子表格模型来计算各种项目的节能效果、估算项目成本以及为设施工作人员撰写报告。我还分析公用事业数据的趋势，找到组合仪表和简化公用事业会计的方法，并寻找可以为客户省钱的费率变化。现在想起来，我自己写了票。麻省理工学院允许我这么做。
My consulting projects include the occasional lighting survey, setting up Lotus or Excel spreadsheet models to calculate energy savings from various projects, estimating costs of the projects, and writing reports for the facilities staff. I also analyze trends in utility data, find ways to combine meters and streamline utility accounting, and look for rate changes that will save my clients money. Come to think of it, I wrote my own ticket. MIT allowed me to do that.
我也一直在制定计划和规范，以征求承包商的投标。我一开始怀疑自己是否有能力做到这一点，因为大多数擅长这项工作的人自从毕业于东北大学或温特沃斯大学后就一直在传统的 A/E（建筑/工程师）公司工作。但我已经熟悉了 AutoCAD 电子绘图软件，并且开发了一个相当不错的规范语言库。当我意识到“计划和规范”可以翻译成“哪里/多大和什么/如何”时，它似乎并不那么令人生畏。此外，我发现“设计”通常只是意味着“弄清楚把东西放在哪里”。
I've also been developing plans and specifications to solicit bids from contractors. I first wondered about my ability to do thatmost of the people who are good at it have worked at traditional A/E (architect/engineer) firms since they graduated from Northeastern or Wentworth. But I've become conversant with AutoCAD electronic drafting software and I've developed a fairly good library of specification language. And when I realize that "Plans and Specifications" can be translated to "Wheres/How Bigs and Whats/Hows," it doesn't seem so daunting. Also, I've discovered that "design" often just means "figure out where to put things."
1999 年 4 月 30 日
April 30, 1999
约翰霍普金斯大学二十周年聚会。我和一位同学聊天，他从约翰霍普金斯大学毕业后在麻省理工学院和医学院都表现出色。“你还不够严厉，”他说。整个系统都是腐败的。我的论文导师利用我在论文研究中发现的东西申请了专利。他以此为基础成立了一家公司，然后以数百万美元的价格卖掉了它。我一分钱也没拿到。我甚至聘请了一名律师，但发现从来没有学生打赢过这样的官司。”
Twentieth reunion, Johns Hopkins. I talk with a classmate who went on from Johns Hopkins to do very well at MIT and also in medical school. "You weren't harsh enough," he says. The whole system is corrupt. My thesis advisor took what I discovered in my thesis research and filed patents on it. He formed a company based on it and then sold it for millions of dollars. I didn't get a cent. I even hired a lawyer, but found out that a student has never won such a case."
1999 年 6 月 25 日
June 25, 1999
飞往底特律机场。我坐在过道座位上。我喜欢随时起身去洗手间。一位男士坐在靠窗的座位上，一位女士坐在我们中间。他们似乎是一对夫妻。
Flying into Detroit Airport. I'm in the aisle seat. I like to be able to get up and go to the bathroom whenever I want to. A man is in the window seat and a woman is between us. They seem to be husband and wife.
我向窗外望去。一股白色气流从放下的襟翼的一角流过。啊，我想。这是翼尖涡流。襟翼的尖点使机翼上方的气流加速并在尖点附近旋转。随着流速的增加，伯努利告诉我们流体的静压会降低。当天气非常潮湿时，就像今天的底特律一样，较低的压力和随之而来的较低温度会导致水蒸气的分压超过其饱和压力。形成一股由微小水滴组成的云流。
I look out the window. A white stream trails the corner of one of the lowered flaps. Ah, I think. A tip vortex. The sharp point of the flap is causing the air flow over the wing to speed up and spin in the neighborhood of the point. As the flow velocity increases, Bernoulli tells us that the fluid's static pressure decreases. When it's really humid, as it is today in Detroit, the lower pressure and consequent lower temperature cause the water vapor's partial pressure to exceed its saturation pressure. A cloud-stream of minute droplets occurs.
我真想跟我右边的那对夫妇分享一下。但是不行，那样会很奇怪。不过丈夫确实在向妻子解释这种现象。飞行员肯定在释放一些燃料，”他说。
I'm dying to share this with the couple to my right. But no, that would be weird. But yes the husband is explaining the phenomenon to his wife. The pilot must be releasing some fuel," he says.
别在意这些，佩珀。别为小事烦恼。拜托。你这个白痴。想想吧。我们是不是要紧急降落了，飞行员是不是想减少可供燃烧的 JP-40 喷气燃料量？我不这么认为。西北航空能承受每次飞机降落时浪费每加仑 3 美元的燃油吗？环境保护署会允许未燃烧的燃油排放到这个拥挤的大都市地区吗？
Let it go, Pepper. Don't sweat the small stuff. Oh please. You idiot. Think about it. Are we about to crash land and the pilot wants to reduce the amount of JP-40 jet fuel that's available to burn? I don't think so. Can Northwest Airlines afford to throw away $3-a-gallon fuel every time a plane lands? Would the Environmental Protection Agency allow the unburned fuel to be released in this congested metropolitan area?
“抱歉，我忍不住偷听了，”我打断道。“你知道，我学的是流体力学，你观察到的现象叫做翼尖涡流。”我开始解释。
"Excuse me, but I couldn't help but overhear," I interrupt. You see, I studied fluid mechanics, and the phenomenon you're observing is called a tip vortex." I launch into an explanation.
“我只知道那里有某种蒸汽，”丈夫最后说道。
"All I know is there's some kind of vapor out there," the husband says at last.
1999 年 7 月 23 日
July 23, 1999
我们 1990 年的福特 Escort 的空调坏了，从佛蒙特州度假回来的路上，温度高达 90 多度。我们的巧克力色拉布拉多小狗黛西呼吸急促。我们在加油站停下，往空的加仑容器里装满水，我边开车边给她浇水。水的蒸发增加了热量从她皮毛中散发出去的速度，她的呼吸最终变得正常了。
The air-conditioning in our 1990 Ford Escort doesn't work anymore, and the temperature is in the mid-90s during our drive back from our Vermont vacation. Daisy, our chocolate lab puppy, is breathing heavily. We stop at a service station, fill the empty gallon container with water, and I pour it on her regularly as we drive along. The evaporation of the water increases the rate of heat transfer away from her fur, and her breathing eventually becomes more normal.
其他人呢？我最后一次见到切特是当我请他审阅本书中的技术材料时。我对火花塞的解释完全错误，这也许可以部分解释为什么斯伦贝谢没有雇用我。切特现在已是终身教授。如果有人教我如何解决问题，那就是切特，他以身作则。
What about the others? I last saw Chet when I asked him to review the technical material in this book. I had the spark plug explanation all wrong, which may partly explain why Schlumberger didn't hire me. Chet now has tenure. If anyone taught me how to solve problems, it was Chet, by example.
我把包括吉夫托普洛斯在内的章节草稿发给他审阅。他纠正了技术错误，但从他红色标记的语气中我感觉到他很不高兴。他没有修改其余部分。这本书出版后，我在麻省理工学院为即将毕业的研究生做演讲，他坐在观众席上，笑容满面。
I sent a draft of the sections that included Gyftopoulos to him for his review. He corrected the technical errors, but by the tone of his red marks I sensed his displeasure. He left the rest of the text alone. When after the book was published I gave a talk for outgoing graduate students at MIT he was in the audience, beaming.
1994 年，我终于和尼克在一起了。我们去了南波士顿海滨的 No Name 鱼餐厅吃午饭。“你发明了什么吗？”他问我。他相信我能发明东西。如果有人教我如何做一个好人，那就是尼克，他以身作则。
I finally got together with Nick in 1994. We went to the No Name fish restaurant on the South Boston waterfront for lunch. "You inventin' anything?" he asked me. He had confidence in me that I could invent things. If anyone taught me how to be a good person, it was Nick, by example.
本和我的实验室搭档斯科特都获得了博士学位，后来进入通用汽车公司工作。我希望很快能在《科学美国人》上看到他们，以“幕后英雄”为题材。两台快速压缩机现已投入使用。这意味着，一些言辞空洞的 24 岁年轻人正在阅读我的论文，也许还有这本书，作为背景材料。在科技的埃菲尔铁塔上，我是一颗铆钉，或者至少是铆钉中的一两个原子。
Ben and my lab partner Scott became Ph.Ds and went on to work at General Motors. I hope to see them in Scientific American soon, featured as "The Men Behind the Work." Two Rapid Compression Machines are now in action. Which means that some mealymouthed 24-year-old kid is reading my thesis, and maybe this book, as background material. In the Eiffel Tower of technology, I am a rivet, or at least an atom or two in a rivet.
安医生在晋升为以色列军队上校后退休。我最后一次见到他是在 1990 年，地点是曼哈顿。他减掉了 20 磅左右的体重，看上去精瘦而善良，比在麻省理工学院时看起来健康得多。他的同胞、麻省理工学院校友比比·内塔尼亚胡仍然活跃在以色列政坛。
Doctor An retired after reaching the rank of colonel in the Israeli army. I last saw him in Manhattan in 1990. He'd lost 20 pounds or so and looked lean and kind and much healthier than he'd ever looked at MIT. His fellow countryman and MIT alum Bibi Netanyahu is still active in Israeli politics.
1986 年埃尔登毕业后不久，他的母亲就不敢把他一个人留在家里——他患有创伤后应激障碍。他没有参加太空计划，但他在洛克希德公司找到了一份编程自动驾驶仪的工作。1992 年我参加了他的婚礼，几年后当我见到他和他的妻子时，他看起来非常开心。
Shortly after Eldon graduated in 1986 his mother was afraid to leave him alone in the house-he was suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder. He didn't make the space program, but he did get a job at Lockheed programming automatic pilots. I went to his wedding in 1992, and he seemed very happy when I saw him and his wife a couple of years after that.
黛安·米切尔是许多高级宿舍男生和女生的综合体。我已经很久没去过 Steer Roast 了，但我知道，在我担任导师时，一个大一的孩子加入了外交部门，并在完成本科学位 10 年内成为了大使，另一个孩子参加了 1988 年奥运会女子划艇队，现在是电气工程教授。高级宿舍本身已经破旧不堪，墙上的艺术品也永远消失了。
Dianne Mitchell is a composite of many Senior House boys and girls. I haven't been to Steer Roast in a long time, but I know that a kid that was a freshman when I started as a tutor joined the Foreign Service and became an ambassador within 10 years of completing his undergraduate degree, and another went to the '88 Olympics on the women's crew team and is now a professor of electrical engineering. Senior House itself has been gutrehabbed and the wall art has been lost forever.
据一位共同朋友的最新报道，斯蒂芬妮已婚，居住在芝加哥地区。
At last report from a mutual friend, Stephanie was married and living in the Chicago area.
还有玛丽。好吧，在男性主导的工程界，我试图谴责自己和他人的性别歧视。可能有点晚了，但我告诉她，我会努力在某一天弥补她。
And Mary. Well, in the male-dominated world of engineering, I try to rebuke sexism in myself and others. It may be a little late, but I told her I'd try to make it up to her someday.
我努力保持天真。我努力做一个善良的人。我努力不做一个自负的人。我努力像人一样思考。
I try to be innocent. I try to be a nice person. I try not to be an egotist. I try to think like a human being.
章节注释
Chapter Notes
第1章
CHAPTER 1
波浪上的独木舟问题。若要直观地了解水波，请参阅《流体力学图解实验》（美国流体力学电影委员会电影笔记书）（马萨诸塞州剑桥：麻省理工学院出版社，1972 年）。该书第 105 页描述了这部电影，名为《流体中的波浪》，由哈佛大学的 Arthur E. Bryson 制作。讨论水波的书籍包括 John A. Knaus 的《物理海洋学导论》（新泽西州恩格尔伍德克利夫斯：Prentice Hall，1978 年）；JN Newman 的《海洋流体动力学》（马萨诸塞州剑桥：麻省理工学院出版社，1977 年）和 O. M. Faltinsen 的《船舶和海上结构上的海载荷》（马萨诸塞州剑桥：剑桥大学出版社，1990 年）。
The Canoeing on Waves Problem. For visual understanding of water waves, consult Illustrated Experiments in Fluid Mechanics (the National Committee on Fluid Mechanics Films book of film notes), (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1972.) The film, described on p. 105 of the book, is entitled Waves in Fluids, and was produced by Arthur E. Bryson of Harvard University. Books that discuss water waves include introduction to Physical Oceanography, by John A. Knaus, (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1978); Marine Hydrodynamics, by J. N. Newman (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1977), and Sea Loads on Ships and Offshore Structures, by 0. M. Faltinsen (Cambridge, Mass.: Cambridge University Press, 1990).
热煮鸡蛋问题。这是一个不稳定的热传导问题。“不稳定”是指整个鸡蛋中每个点的温度都会随时间变化。如果你把鸡蛋从冷水中拿出来，它会感觉很热，直到整个鸡蛋冷却下来。Rohsenow 和 Choi 所著的《热、质量和动量传递》（新泽西州恩格尔伍德克利夫斯：Prentice Hall，1961 年）第 110-19 页讨论了各种几何形状中的不稳定热传导。
The Hot Hard-Boiled Egg Problem. This is an unsteady heat conduction problem. "Unsteady" means that throughout the egg, the temperature at each point changes with time. If you take the egg out of the cold water, it will feel hot until the whole egg is cooled off. Unsteady heat conduction in various geometries is discussed in Heat, Mass, and Momentum Transfer, by Rohsenow and Choi (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1961), pp. 110-19.
第2章
CHAPTER 2
流体力学。我选修 2.25 时，有人推荐我阅读 Potter 和 Foss 合著的《流体力学》（纽约：John Wiley & Sons，1975 年）。同时推荐的还有 DJ Tritton 合著的《物理流体动力学》（纽约：Van Nostrand Reinhold，1977 年）。
Fluid Mechanics. The text Fluid Mechanics, by Potter and Foss (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1975) was recommended as a reference when I took 2.25. Also recommended was Physical Fluid Dynamics, by D. J. Tritton (New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1977).
热力学。有关热力学原理和 Gyftopoulos 讲座中所述概念定义的进一步阐述，请参阅：Hatsopoulos 和 Keenan 合著的《一般热力学原理》（佛罗里达州马拉巴尔：Krieger Publishing [最初由 John Wiley & Sons 于 1965 年出版]）；Elias P. Gyftopoulos 和 Gian Paolo Beretta 合著的《热力学基础和应用》（纽约：Macmillan，1991 年）；以及 Hatsopoulos、Gyftopoulos 和 Keenan 合著的《大英百科全书》中题为“热力学原理”的文章。为了节省您去图书馆的时间，下面定义了一些术语。定义来自课程 2.45 1 的讲座笔记和/或课堂讲义，或如有说明，来自《麦格劳希尔科学和技术术语词典》第 2 版。
Thermodynamics. For further elaboration on the thermodynamic principles and definitions of concepts described in the lectures by Gyftopoulos, refer to: Principles of General Thermodynamics, by Hatsopoulos and Keenan, (Malabar, Fla.: Krieger Publishing [originally published by John Wiley & Sons, 1965] ); Thermodynamics, Foundations and Applications by Elias P. Gyftopoulos and Gian Paolo Beretta (New York: Macmillan, 1991); and the article in Encyclopaedia Britannica entitled "Thermodynamics, Principles of," by Hatsopoulos, Gyftopoulos, and Keenan. To save you a trip to the library, some terms are defined below. Definitions are drawn from lecture notes and/or class handouts for course 2.45 1, or where noted, from the McGraw Hill Dictionary of Scientific and Technical Terms, 2nd Edition.
状态：系统在某一时刻的状况，涵盖了在该时刻对系统进行的任何测量或观察的结果。
State: The condition of a system at an instant in time, which encompasses all that can be said about the results of any measurements or observations that can be performed on the system at that instant in time.
系统：任何可识别的物质集合，可以通过明确界定的表面与其他物质分开，以便可以通过跨表面的传输过程来描述“系统”与其他物质之间的相互作用。
System: Any identifiable collection of matter that can be separated from everything else by a well-defined surface so that the interaction between the "system" and everything else may be described by transfer processes across the surface.
熵：根据《麦格劳·希尔科学和技术术语词典》，熵是“热力学系统状态的函数，其任何微分可逆过程中的变化等于系统从周围环境吸收的热量除以系统的绝对温度。也称为热荷。”
Entropy: According to the McGraw Hill Dictionary of Scientific and Technical Terms, entropy is "a function of the state of a thermodynamic system whose change in any differential reversible process is equal to the heat absorbed by the system from its surroundings divided by the absolute temperature of the system. Also known as thermal charge."
能量：再次引用麦格劳·希尔的说法：“做功的能力”。严格来说，从热力学的角度来看，麦格劳·希尔的定义并不正确，因为能量可以分为热能和所有其他能量。热能的特点是并非所有热能都可用于做功。热力学第二定律对此有所限制。2.451 笔记用了八页来定义能量，因此进一步阅读绝对是必要的。
Energy: Again from McGraw Hill: "the capacity for doing work." Strictly speaking from a thermodynamics point of view, the McGraw Hill definition is not correct because energy may be classified as thermal energy and all other energy. Thermal energy has the distinction that not all of it is available for doing work. There is a limitation imposed by the Second Law of Thermodynamics. The 2.451 notes spent eight pages defining energy, so further reading is definitely in order.
属性：其值取决于系统状态而非历史的任何量；对于给定状态，属性的值可以通过某种类型的测量来确定。
Property: Any quantity the value of which depends on the state but not the history of the system; for a given state the value of a property can be determined by some type of measurement.
焓：来自麦格劳希尔：“系统的内部能量加上系统体积乘以系统周围环境对系统施加的压力的乘积的总和。”
Enthalpy: From McGraw Hill: "The sum of the internal energy of a system plus the product of the system's volume multiplied by the pressure exerted on the system by its surroundings."
稳定平衡状态：只能通过在环境中留下净效应的相互作用来改变的平衡状态。
Stable equilibrium state: An equilibrium state that can only be altered by interactions that leave net effects in the environment.
温度：来自麦格劳希尔：“物体的一种特性，当该物体与另一个物体热接触时，它决定了热流的方向；热量从温度较高的区域流向温度较低的区域。
Temperature: From McGraw Hill: "A property of an object which determines the direction of heat flow when the object is placed in thermal contact with another object; heat flows from a region of higher temperature to one of lower temperature.
压力：来自麦格劳·希尔：“一种在所有方向上均匀施加的应力；其测量单位是单位面积上的力。”
Pressure: From McGraw Hill: "A type of stress which is exerted uniformly in all directions; its measure is the force per unit area."
可用能量：系统在某一状态下的属性，参考恒定温度和压力的环境；可用能量是从系统和参考环境的组合中可提取的最大有用功。
Available Energy: A property of a system at a state, in reference to an environment of constant temperature and pressure; available energy is the maximum useful work that can be extracted from the combination of the system and the referenced environment.
下面列出了在一般 MIT 环境中使用的其他术语。
Other terms in use in the general MIT environment are listed below.
冲洗（动词）：毫不含糊地拒绝。
Flush (verb): To reject unequivocally.
火焰（动词）：有力地争论某个观点。
Flame (verb): To argue a point of view forcefully.
Cruisillate（cruise + oscillate，动词）：运转非常快。用于描述电子芯片。
Cruisillate (cruise + oscillate, verb): To function very fast. Used in describing electronic chips.
工具（动词）：努力学习；（名词）努力学习的人。
Tool (verb): to study very hard; (noun) one who studies very hard.
Power Tool（动词）：努力学习；（名词）努力学习的人。
Power Tool (verb) : to study very hard; (noun) one who studies very hard.
Bogossify（bogus + ossify，动词）：伪造，如实验室项目的结果。
Bogossify (bogus + ossify, verb): To fake, as in results for a laboratory project.
Bogosity（bogus + fugacity，名词）：虚假的状态。
Bogosity (bogus + fugacity, noun): State of being bogus.
圣经（名词）：课程笔记本，厚 3 到 4 英寸，包括问题集的解决方案、讲义和过去的考试。
Bible (noun): Notebook for a course, 3 to 4 inches thick, including worked-out solution sets to problem sets, lecture notes, and past exams.
Grease（名词）：具有政治倾向、谋求全校学生选举职位的人。参见贪污犯。
Grease (noun): A politically oriented person seeking institutewide student elective office. See embezzler.
地铁冲浪：乘坐波士顿 MBTA 红线，站立，不扶任何东西。
Subway Surfing: Riding on the Boston MBTA Red Line, standing up, without holding onto anything.
全周学习：麻省理工学院 (MIT) 版本的通宵学习。
All-weeker: MIT's version of an all-nighter.
虽然有定义，“Kvel”在意第绪语中表示一种极度自豪的感觉，就像父母看到孩子从麻省理工学院毕业一样。
And while definitions are being offered, "Kvel" is Yiddish for a sense of extreme pride, as when a parent sees a child graduate from MIT.
封闭房间内油燃烧问题。我对这个问题的前半部分回答正确。如果房间完全隔热和密封，则不会发生能量变化，也不会发生质量变化。
Oil Burning in Closed Room Problem. I was right about the first half of the problem. If the room were perfectly insulated and sealed, there would be no change in energy and no change in mass.
问题的第二部分比较棘手：“如果最大能量被转移到环境中，油气混合物和燃烧产物之间的质量变化是什么？”
The second part of the question was trickier: "What is the change in mass between the oil-air mixture and the products of combustion if the maximum energy is transferred to the environment?"
他们希望我们引用爱因斯坦著名的方程式：E = mc2。如果燃烧产生的热量全部通过房间墙壁传导，房间内的能量就会因燃烧而减少，因此房间内物品的质量也会减少。
They wanted us to invoke Einstein's famous equation: E = mc2. If all the heat of combustion were conducted through the walls of the room, the energy in the room would be reduced by the combustion, and thus the mass of the contents of the room would be reduced.
问题首先是找到燃烧的能量：
The problem is first to find the energy of combustion:
所以房间里物品的质量确实减少了，大约减少了七分之一毫克。由于没有掌握这个技巧，我在 50 分的题目中丢掉了 3 分。
So the mass of the contents of the room did decline, by about seven-tenths of a milligram. I lost 3 points out of 50 on the problem set for missing that trick.
第3章
CHAPTER 3
汽油和鸡蛋问题。该问题是为了确定需要多少个鸡蛋来喂饱抽水的人，以及需要多少汽油。
The Gasoline and Egg Problem. The problem was to determine how many eggs would be required to feed the human to pump the water, and also to see how much gasoline would be required.
首先，计算将水从井底上提起所产生的势能变化。
First, calculate the change in potential energy associated with lifting the water up from the bottom of the well.
为了确定所需的鸡蛋数量，我们需要将千克卡路里转换为焦耳，并考虑到人类原动力的 25% 效率。
To find the number of eggs required, we need to convert from kg-calories to joules, and to take into account the 25 percent efficiency of the human prime mover.
所需鸡蛋数量 =
Number of eggs required =
汽油消耗量可以用类似方法计算：
The gasoline consumption can be calculated similarly:
本例中的能源成本比例为：
The ratio of energy costs in this example is:
鸡蛋作为燃料的成本是汽油成本的 12.3 倍。接下来，我们需要计算骑车人的劳动力成本。假设这是一位体格健壮的骑车人，可以持续产生约 1/4 马力，即约 190 瓦，则抽干所有水所需的时间为：
The cost of eggs as a fuel is 12.3 times the cost of gasoline. Next, we need to calculate the labor cost of the cyclist. Assuming this is a strong cyclist and can generate about 1/4 horsepower continuously, or about 190 watts, the time required to pump all the water would be:
按每小时 4 美元计算，这项费用约为 200 美元。
This cost comes to about $200, at $4 per hour.
接下来，计算一下确保波斯湾油田安全所需的军事力量成本。每天增加 10 亿美元，再加上每条生命损失 10 万美元，乘以 X 条生命损失……哎呀。我又开始政治正确了。可耻可耻可耻可耻可耻。当然，如果这是用发光手稿写的，而不是用 200 瓦的个人电脑写的，在三盏 75 瓦的灯下，办公室里还有大约 300 瓦的其他照明灯，让我在周六工作时感到安全，那么，我可能更有立足之地。
Next, calculate the cost of the military might required to secure the oil fields in the Persian Gulf. At an incremental cost of $1 billion per day, plus a cost of, say, $100,000 per life lost, times X lives lost.... Uh-oh. There I go being politically correct again. Shame shame shame shame shame. Of course, if this were written by illuminated manuscript rather than on a personal computer using 200 watts, under three 75 watt lights, with about 300 watts of other lighting on in the office to make me feel secure while working on a Saturday, well then, I might have more of a leg to stand on.
三块问题。问题陈述为：“有三块相同的金属块。最初它们的温度分别为 300、500 和 700 K（开尔文）。对于每个块，稳定平衡状态的内部能量和温度之间的关系由以下关系给出：
The Three Block Problem. The problem statement was: "Three identical blocks of metal are available. Initially they are at temperatures 300, 500, and 700 K (Kelvin). For each of the blocks, the relation between internal energy and temperature of stable equilibrium states is given by the relation:
“U = Uo + C * T，其中 C 是热容量，T 是开尔文温度。假设 C = 10 焦耳/开尔文度（答案与 C 无关）。
"U = Uo + C * T, where C is the heat capacity and T is the temperature in degrees Kelvin. Let's say C = 10 joule/Degree K (the answer is independent of C).
“如果允许块之间通过循环机械进行相互作用，但不允许块与环境之间进行相互作用，那么其中一个块可以达到的最高温度是多少？”
"If interactions via cyclic machinery between blocks are allowed but interactions between the blocks and the environment are not, what is the maximum temperature that can be reached by one of the blocks?"
Gyftopoulos教授和Beretta教授给我的提示如下：
The hint that Professors Gyftopoulos and Beretta gave me was as follows:
在该过程结束时，两个块的温度将相同，并且一个块的温度最高。如果两个块的温度不相同，则可以使用循环机制进一步升高第三个块的温度。如果所有过程都是可逆的（没有熵增加），则将获得第三个块的最高温度。
At the end of the process, two blocks will have the same temperature, and one block will have the highest available temperature. If the two blocks did not have the same temperature, the cyclic machinery could be used to raise the temperature of the third block further. The highest temperature of the third block will be obtained if all processes are reversible (there is no entropy increase).
描述这个问题的场景绝不是要贬低吉夫托普洛斯教授，而是要展示一个学生被麻省理工学院的压力和卓越标准压得喘不过气来的例子。麻省理工学院有很多优秀的老师，吉夫托普洛斯教授就是其中之一。在他的讲座中，我多次起鸡皮疙瘩，因为他清晰地呈现材料的方式，材料的性质以及它如何与我的节能兴趣相吻合，以及他的热情。
The scene in which this problem was described is meant in no way to reflect negatively on Professor Gyftopoulos, but rather to present an example of a student's being overwhelmed by the pressure and standards of excellence at MIT. There are great teachers at MIT, and Professor Gyftopoulos is one of them. On numerous occasions during his lectures I had goose bumps from both the way he clearly presented the material, and from the nature of the material and how it coincided with my energy-conservation interests, and from his enthusiasm.
板冷却问题。再次参考 Rohsenow 和 Choi 的《热、质量和动量传递》，第 143-53 页。文中介绍了温度分布均匀的平板的情况。《传热手册》（WM Rohsenow 和 James P. Harnett 编著，纽约：McGrawHill，1973 年），第 159-160 页介绍了均匀热通量的情况。
Plate Cooling Problem. Again refer to Rohsenow and Choi, Heat, Mass and Momentum Transfer, pp. 143-53. Presented there is the case of a flat plate with a uniform temperature distribution. The uniform heat flux case is presented in Handbook of Heat Transfer, by W. M. Rohsenow and James P. Harnett (New York: McGrawHill, 1973), pp. 159-160.
还请注意，在 Rohsenow 和 Choi 的著作第 117 页中，有一个理论问题（例如无限平板）的解决方案可以应用于真实系统（火箭发动机燃烧室壁）的例子。壁是一个圆柱形壳体，壁厚小于直径，并计算为无限平板。
Also note, on p. 117 of Rohsenow and Choi, an example of when the solution of a theoretical problem, such as the infinite flat plate, can be applied to a real system, the wall of a rocket motor combustion chamber. The wall is a cylindrical shell, with a wall thickness that is small compared to the diameter, and is calculated as an infinite flat plate.
第四章
CHAPTER 4
运动死亡。高级宿舍 T 恤上的设计来自 Hunter S. Thompson 博士所著的《恐惧与厌恶：1972 年竞选之路》（旧金山：Straight Arrow Books，1973 年）的封面。运动死亡设计与 Thomas W. Benton 的封面设计完全相同，不同之处在于运动死亡骷髅的眼睛中没有纳粹标志，而 Benton 设计的牙齿上没有任何清晰可辨的文字。在 Thompson 博士的介绍中，第 17 页，麻省理工学院图书馆的这本书的页边空白处用铅笔写着“运动死亡”，旁边是以下段落（此处略有删节）：
Sport Death. The design on the Senior House T-shirt is from the cover of Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72, by Dr. Hunter S. Thompson (San Francisco: Straight Arrow Books, 1973). The Sport Death design is identical to the cover design, by Thomas W. Benton, with the exception that the Sport Death skull doesn't have swastikas in the eyes, and the Benton design doesn't have anything legible written in the teeth. In Dr. Thompson's introduction, on page 17, "Sport Death" is written in pencil in the margin in the MIT library's copy of the book, next to this (here slightly abridged) paragraph:
那些自称了解长耳大野兔的人会告诉你，它们的主要动机是恐惧、愚蠢和疯狂。但我在长耳大野兔的国度待了足够长的时间，知道它们中的大多数都过着相当枯燥的生活；它们厌倦了日常生活：吃饭……睡觉，偶尔在灌木丛里跳来跳去……难怪有些长耳大野兔偶尔会越过底线，寻求廉价的刺激；蹲在路边，等待下一组车头灯出现，然后在瞬间冲出灌木丛，在飞驰的前轮前几英寸处穿过灌木丛，这必定会让人肾上腺素激增。
People who claim to know jackrabbits will tell you they are primarily motivated by Fear, Stupidity, and Craziness. But I have spent enough time in jackrabbit country to know that most of them lead pretty dull lives; they are bored with their daily routines: eat ... sleep, hop around a bush now and then. ... No wonder some of them drift over the line into cheap thrills once in a while; there has to be a powerful adrenaline rush in crouching by the side of a road, waiting for the next set of headlights to come along, then streaking out of the bushes with split-second timing and making it across to the other side just inches in front of the speeding front wheels.
第 11 章的注释中会有更多关于“运动死亡”的内容。
There will be more on Sport Death in the Chapter 11 notes.
伯努利方程。参见 Potter 和 Foss 的《流体力学》，第 4955 页。伯努利方程由丹尼尔·伯努利在其 1738 年出版的《流体动力学》一书中提出，是流体力学的一般方程——纳维-斯托克斯方程的一个特例。它适用于稳定（不随时间变化）、无粘性（无粘性）、无旋性（无漩涡）、不可压缩的流体。除了化油器，它还适用于曲线球、香水吸气器和飞机机翼等。实际方程为：
Bernoulli Equation. See Potter and Foss, Fluid Mechanics, pp. 4955. The Bernoulli equation, stated by Daniel Bernoulli in his 1738 book Hydrodynamica, is a special case of the general equations of fluid mechanics, the Navier-Stokes equations. It applies to steady (no variation with time), inviscid (not viscous), irrotational (no whirlpools), incompressible flow. Besides the carburetor, it also applies to things like curveballs, perfume aspirators, and airplane wings. The actual equation is:
其中P是流体压力，p是流体密度，g是重力加速度常数，z是流体高度，v是流体速度。
where P is fluid pressure, p is fluid density, g is gravitational acceleration constant, z is the height of the fluid, and v is the fluid velocity.
《美国百科全书》指出，丹尼尔·伯努利是瑞士人，出生于荷兰格罗宁根。他是瑞士巴塞尔大学的解剖学教授。由于他不是意大利人（正如他的名字所暗示的那样），而是瑞士人，因此他不太可能 (a) 有一个在佛罗伦萨开珠宝店的表亲，或者 (b) 接受过美第奇或斯福扎基金会的资助。然而，我们在学习期间并不知道这一点，所以这个形象是有道理的。
In Encyclopaedia Americana it is noted that Daniel Bernoulli was Swiss, born in Groningen, Netherlands. He was a professor of anatomy at the University of Basel, Switzerland. Since he was not Italian as his name suggests, but rather Swiss, it is unlikely that he either (a) had a cousin with a jewelry shop in Florence or (b) received funding from the Medici or Sforza foundations. We did not know this at our study session, however, so the image made sense.
化油器。《内燃机》（作者 CF Taylor，第 2 卷，第 193 页）中讨论了真正的化油器。该书中描述的真实化油器与此处描述的化油器的区别在于，在真正的化油器中，空气被认为是可压缩的，而我们假设空气是不可压缩的。有关化油器的简单描述，请参阅《事物的工作原理》（作者 David Macaulay，波士顿：霍顿·米夫林，1988 年），第 148 页。
The Carburetor. A discussion of a real carburetor is in The Internal Combustion Engine, by C. F. Taylor, Vol. 2, pp. 193ff. The difference between the real carburetors described in that book and what is described in here is that in real carburetors, the air is considered compressible, whereas we assumed the air was incompressible. For a simple description of a carburetor, see The Way Things Work, by David Macaulay (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1988), p. 148.
在这种情况下，伯努利方程的要点是，当流体加速时，其静压（如果你在管壁上放置气压计，你将读到的压力）会下降。由于收缩时流动速度加快，静压会下降，低于大气压，而处于大气压下的液体会被加速空气产生的真空吸入。
The main point of the Bernoulli equation in this case is that when the fluid speeds up, its static pressure (the pressure you would read if you put a barometer on the wall of the tube) goes down. Since the flow speeds up in the contraction, the static pressure does go down, below atmospheric pressure, and the liquid, at atmospheric pressure, is sucked in by the vacuum created by the sped up air.
仅从空气方面来看，方程式如下：
Just looking at the air side, the equations are:
连续性：
Continuity:
伯努利：
Bernoulli:
茶叶问题。有关更多信息，请参阅《流体力学图解实验》，第 97 页。这部名为《二次流》的影片由麻省理工学院的 Edward Taylor 教授制作。
The Tea Leaf Problem. For more on this, refer to Illustrated Experiments in Fluid Mechanics, p. 97. The film, entitled Secondary Flow, was produced by Professor Edward Taylor of MIT.
消防站问题。问题是：“如果每名消防员能够提供 125 磅的水平力，那么需要多少名消防员来握住每分钟以 100 英尺每秒的速度喷出 800 加仑水的消防水带？”
The Firehouse Problem. The question was: "How many firemen will it take to hold on to a fire hose shooting out 800 gallons per minute at 100 feet per second, if each is capable of providing a horizontal force of 125 pounds?"
限制软管所需的力等于质量流速乘以软管流出的速度。首先，将所有值转换为公制单位：
The force required to restrain the hose will be equal to the mass flow rate times the velocity going out of the hose. First, convert everything to metric units:
第五章
CHAPTER 5
河流管道问题。通过建造类似风车的水下涡轮机，您可以从流动的河流中提取电力，而无需建造水坝。这将能够提取流经涡轮叶片扫过的圆形区域的能量的 16/27 或 59%。有关普通风车的这一限制的讨论，请参阅 David Rittenhouse Inglis 著的《风能和其他能源选择》（安娜堡：密歇根大学出版社，1978 年），第 248 页。水下涡轮机可产生的最大功率为：
The Tube in the River Problem. You could extract power from a flowing river without building a dam by constructing an underwater turbine resembling a windmill. This would be able to extract 16/27, or 59 percent of the energy flowing through the circular area swept by the turbine blades. For a discussion of this limit for regular windmills, see Wind Power and Other Energy Options, by David Rittenhouse Inglis, (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1978), p. 248. The maximum power that could be derived from an underwater turbine would be:
第六章
CHAPTER 6
辐射传热。请参阅 Rohsenow 和 Choi 的《热量、质量和动量传递》第 13 章。另请参阅 Siegel 和 Howell 的《热辐射传热》第 2 版（纽约：Hemisphere Publishing，1981 年）。
Radiation Heat Transfer. Refer to Rohsenow and Choi, Heat, Mass and Momentum Transfer, Ch. 13. Also refer to Thermal Radiation Heat Transfer, 2nd ed., by Siegel and Howell (New York: Hemisphere Publishing, 1981).
第7章
CHAPTER 7
以下是一些不太符合本书主旨的补充内容。首先，我从麻省理工学院的各种技术人员和机械师那里获得了大量支持和实践教育。尼克就是所有这些人的综合体。
Here are a couple of afterthoughts that didn't really fit in the flow of the book. First, I derived a lot of support and hands-on education from various technicians and machinists at MIT. Nick is a composite of all of these people.
其次，当我在进行实验时，电话那头友好的销售人员的声音会帮助我解决一些设计问题。现在我从事的咨询工程行业似乎也是如此。我，一名工程师，受到供应商的教育，他们可能是也可能不是工程师，但他们已经充分了解了他们的产品如何适应更大的系统。
Second, when I was putting the experiment together, friendly salesmen's voices on the other end of the line would help me work my way through some of the design problems. And so it seems to be in the consulting engineering world I work in now. I, the engineer, am educated by the vendors, who may or may not be engineers, but who have been thoroughly briefed on how their products fit within larger systems.
最后，当我在实验中将“设计”一词翻译为“弄清楚把东西放在哪里”和/或“弄清楚东西应该有多大”时，我对它的恐惧就小了很多。
Finally, I became a lot less scared of the word design when I translated it to, in the context of my experiment, "figuring out where to put things," and/or "figuring out how big things should be."
与我的实验有关的一些定义：
Some definitions pertaining to my experiment:
测试矩阵。一组用于增强人们对某个过程的了解的实验。例如，如果您认为两个变量（如气缸中的初始空气温度和空气运动量）会影响第三个结果（如柴油点燃所需的时间），则可以构建一个类似于井字棋盘的东西，如下所示：
Test Matrix. The set of experiments used to enhance one's knowledge about a process. For example, if you think two variables, such as initial air temperature in the cylinder and amount of air motion, affect a third result, such as the time it takes the diesel fuel to ignite, you could construct something that looks like a tic-tac-toe board as shown below:
延迟时间是通过实验改变的输入、空气运动和温度的输出。
The delay times are the outputs of the experimentally varied inputs, air motion, and temperature.
湍流水平。湍流水平也被称为湍流强度，在 JB Heywood 所著的《内燃机基础》（纽约：麦格劳-希尔出版社，1988 年）第 331 页中，湍流水平被定义为“湍流中瞬时流体速度波动分量的均方根值”。湍流强度是衡量流动混乱程度的指标；河流中的急流比平直的河段湍流强度更高。
Turbulence Level. Also known as turbulence intensity, this is defined in Internal Combustion Engine Fundamentals, by J. B. Heywood (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1988), p. 331, as "the root mean square value of the fluctuating component of the instantaneous fluid velocity in a turbulent flow." Turbulence intensity is a measure of how chaotic a flow is; rapids in a river have higher turbulence intensity than smooth, straight stretches.
涡流速率。空气在发动机气缸内旋转的速率。
Swirl Rates. The rate at which air spins within the engine's cylinder.
参数影响。参照上面的测试矩阵，参数是温度和空气运动。这些参数根据实验的输入而变化，以查看对实验输出的影响，在本例中为点火延迟时间。
Parametric Influences. Referring to the test matrix above, the parameters are temperature and air motion. These parameters are varied on the input of the experiment, to see the influence on the output of the experiment, in this case the ignition delay time.
点火延迟。柴油发动机中燃料喷射开始和燃料燃烧开始之间的时间。
Ignition Delay. The time between the start of fuel injection and the start of combustion of the fuel in a diesel engine.
发动机。有关发动机工作原理的更多讨论，请参阅 David Macaulay 所著的《事物的运作方式》，第 164-65 页。有关更多技术讨论，请参阅 CF Taylor 所著的《内燃机理论与实践》（马萨诸塞州剑桥：麻省理工学院出版社，1960 年和 1966 年 [第 1 卷]，1968 年 [第 2 卷]）或 JB Heywood 所著的《内燃机基础》。此外，Lyle Cummins（即 Cummins Engine Company）所著的《内部火灾》可从美国汽车工程师学会（邮寄 34 美元至 Department 2414；SAE；400 Commonwealth Drive；Warrendale, PA 15096）获得。
Engines. For more discussion of how engines work, consult The Way Things Work, by David Macaulay, pp. 164-65. Or for more technical discussion, consult The Internal Combustion Engine in Theory and Practice by C. F. Taylor (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1960 and 1966 [Vol. 1], 1968 [Vol. 2]), or Internal Combustion Engine Fundamentals, by J. B. Heywood. Also, Internal Fire, by Lyle Cummins (as in Cummins Engine Company), is available from the Society of Automotive Engineers (mail $34 to Department 2414; SAE; 400 Commonwealth Drive; Warrendale, PA 15096).
滑轮。同样，请参阅《事物运作的方式》，第 58-65 页。
Pulleys. Again, see The Way Things Work, pp. 58-65.
第八章
CHAPTER 8
蒸汽机。参见《事物的运作方式》，第 166-67 页。基本上，热源（煤、气或油火、核裂变或聚焦的阳光）像在茶壶中一样将水煮沸。蒸汽压力随着加热而增加，高压蒸汽推动蒸汽涡轮叶片。当蒸汽推动涡轮叶片时，它会冷却并降低压力，然后被吸入冷凝器，在那里被来自附近湖泊、海洋或冷却塔的水冷却。然后水被泵回锅炉，再次变成蒸汽。这一切都是在 18 世纪后期开发的。起初，他们没有单独的冷凝器，然后在 1765 年，瓦特发现如果他们添加这些冷凝器，他们将节省大量燃料。然后大约在 1800 年，特里维西克增加了高压蒸汽的创新，因此可以将更多的动力装入更小的发动机中。
Steam Engine. See again The Way Things Work, pp. 166-67. Basically, a heat source, either a coal, gas, or oil fire, a nuclear fission, or focused sunlight, boils water as in a teakettle. The steam pressure increases as it's heated, and the high-pressure steam pushes on steam turbine blades. As the steam pushes on the turbine blades it cools and drops in pressure and is sucked into the condenser, where it is cooled by water from the nearby lake or ocean or cooling tower. The water then is pumped back into the boiler, where it again becomes steam. This was all developed in the late 1700s. At first, they didn't have separate condensers, and then in 1765 Watt figured out they'd save a lot of fuel if they added those. And then about 1800 Trevithick added the innovation of high-pressure steam, so more power could be packed into a smaller engine.
“Pong”电子游戏的发明。据我足球队的守门员说，他于 1974 年选修了 6.111 门数字电子实验室课程，这款游戏是他上课时作为课堂项目发明的。课后，他没有更多关于这项发明的去向的数据。
"Pong " video game invention. According to the goalie on my soccer team, who took 6.111, the digital electronics lab, in 1974, this game was invented as a class project when he took the class. He has no more data on what happened to the invention after the class.
气球问题。正文中提出的气球问题被简化为不可压缩流动的情况，并且流过孔口时不会产生能量损失。此简化示例的方程如下所示：
Balloon Problem. The balloon problem presented in the main text is simplified to a case with incompressible flow and with no energy losses associated with the flow through the orifice. The equations for this simplified example are presented below:
第九章
CHAPTER 9
自行车比赛的突围与信息流更好的系统有关，因此熵更低、效率更高，这个例子暗示了信息理论在热力学中的应用。有关此主题的更多阅读材料，请参阅 Myron Tribus 所著的《热力学和热力学：能量、信息和物质状态简介及工程应用》（新泽西州普林斯顿：Van Nostrand，1961 年）。
The example of the bicycle race breakaway as it relates to a system with better information flow and hence lower entropy and higher efficiency alludes to the application of information theory to thermodynamics. For further reading on this subject, refer to Thermostatics and Thermodynamics: An introduction to Energy, Information, and States of Matter, with Engineering Applications, by Myron Tribus, (Princeton, N.J.: Van Nostrand, 1961).
第十章
CHAPTER 10
第一件有趣的事情。本世纪初麻省理工学院的天才诺伯特·韦纳 (Norbert Weiner) 正在教微积分课，这时一名学生要求他做黑板上的一道家庭作业题。韦纳教授看了课本上的问题，在脑中算了一下，然后把答案写在黑板上。这位勇敢的学生接着问道：“你能用另一种方法算吗？”韦纳教授再次看了课本上的问题陈述，在脑中算了一下，然后把同样的答案写在黑板上。
First Amusing Anecdote. Norbert Weiner, MIT genius from earlier in the century, was teaching a calculus class when one of the students asked him to do one of the homework problems on the board. Professor Weiner looked at the problem in the textbook, did it in his head, and wrote the answer on the board. The intrepid student then asked, "Could you do that another way?" Professor Weiner again looked at the problem statement in the book, did it in his head another way, and wrote the same answer on the board.
第十一章
CHAPTER 11
更多关于“运动死亡”的内容。这需要一点挖掘。“运动死亡”一词是由亚利桑那州的一名地质学学生引入高级宿舍和麻省理工学院的，他从约塞米蒂和西部其他攀岩场所的攀岩者和跳伞者那里学到了这个词。这件 T 恤出现在 1976-1977 学年，当时 Runkle 4th 和 5th 的几名学生产生了这个想法。事实上，他们当时正在阅读 Hunter Thompson 的书（《1972 年竞选之路上的恐惧和厌恶》），而图书馆副本边缘用铅笔写下的对“运动死亡”的提及实际上是将 T 恤上的两个图像联系在一起的原因。Runkle 四楼的那幅画是在 T 恤出现后不久画的。
More on Sport Death. This took a little digging. The term Sport Death was imported to Senior House and MIT by a geology student from Arizona, who had picked it up from rock climbers and parachutists at Yosemite and other rock-climbing sites out West. The T-shirt appeared in the academic year '76-'77, when several students on Runkle 4th and 5th had the idea. They were in fact reading the Hunter Thompson book at the time (Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72) and the reference to Sport Death penciled in the margin of the library copy of the book was in fact the connection that brought the two images together on the shirt. The painting on the fourth floor of Runkle was painted some time after the T-shirt appeared.
一些十年前与我交谈过的 Senior House 校友也对 MIT 有一些有趣的看法，他们的一些评论如下：
Some of the Senior House alums of ten or so years ago who I talked to had interesting things to say about MIT as well, and some of their comments follow:
真正的故事发生在贝克之家。他们在那里孤独地死去。除此之外，真正的故事是，这些学生时代可悲的呆子成年后仍然可悲。这些男人娶了他们能娶到的第一个女人，由于他们从未学习过任何社交或人际技能，他们发现自己只能从事低级管理工作。哈佛也一样糟糕，但你必须记住这些人在青春期时做了什么。哈佛的孩子通过担任校报编辑和学生会成员等方式进入哈佛，而麻省理工学院的大多数人只是一直在学习科学和数学，所以他们的成绩和 SAT 成绩足以让他们进入麻省理工学院。
The real story is over at Baker House. That's where they die of loneliness. And then beyond that the real story is that these dweebs who were pathetic as students stay pathetic as maladjusted adults. The men marry the first women they can, and since they never learned any social or human skills, they find themselves stuck in low-level management jobs. Harvard's just as bad, but you have to remember what these people were doing while they were going through puberty. The kids at Harvard got in there by being editor of the school newspaper and being on the student council and stuff like that, while most of the people at MIT were just studying their science and math all the time, so their grades and SAT's would be good enough to get them into MIT.
一位校友向我讲述了“运动死亡”的故事：
And from the alumna who told me the Sport Death story:
我在那里有两个朋友自杀了。这也是我们中的一些人创办 Nightline 的原因之一，这是一种电话服务，你可以在绝望的时候打电话找人倾诉。我认为除了孤独和紧张的工作氛围之外，还有几个原因。很多学生都在天才和疯子之间徘徊，有些人则在这条线上徘徊：在 Senior House 的案例中，毒品可能在某些情况下加剧了这个问题。关键在于，这些人中的许多人在高中时并没有很好地适应环境，当他们来到麻省理工学院不正常的环境中时，没有很好的机会适应环境，而当他们离开时，他们仍然无法适应环境。当我在那里时，还有一个额外的问题，即每 8 名男性对应 1 名女性，因此当一名女学生离开麻省理工学院时，她必须应对不像在麻省理工学院那样受到的关注。此外，你来到这里，已经习惯了在高中成为最优秀的学生，而你却只是普通学生，或者低于平均水平。我是我高中里唯一会弹钢琴的人，我来到这里，每个人都会弹钢琴……我喜欢你的标题。我认为这总结得很好。我以前叫它“金属大师”，取自 T. Rex 的歌曲。我认为它有同样的冷酷金属感。
Two of my friends there killed themselves. That's one of the reasons some of us started Nightline, the phone service that you could call to have someone to talk to in times of desperation. I think it happens for a couple of reasons, beyond the loneliness and the intense work atmosphere. A lot of students are pushing that fine line between genius and insanity, and some go back and forth across that line: In the case of Senior House, maybe the drugs exacerbated the problem in some cases. The key is that when many of these people were in high school they weren't that well adjusted, and when they come to the abnormal environment of MIT there's no great opportunity to become well adjusted, and then when they leave they're still maladjusted. When I was there there was also the added issue that there were eight men for every woman, so when a woman student left MIT, she'd have to cope with not as much attention as she had at MIT. Plus you come here and you're used to being the best in high school and you're just average, or below. I was the only piano player in my high school, and I came here and everyone plays.... I like your title. I think that sums it up well. I used to call it "Metal Guru," after the song by T. Rex. I think it has that same cold metallic sense.
来自 Sport Death T-shirt 的主要消息来源：“麻省理工学院的每个人都有自己的事要做。如果他们对某件事感兴趣，他们就会全身心投入其中……他们是如此投入。没有人会无精打采；他们真的投入到他们所做的事情中。”
And from the primary Sport Death T-shirt source: "Everybody at MIT has something going on. If they're into something they're way into it ... they're so wired up. Nobody's lethargic; they're really involved in what they're doing."
研究生恐怖故事。这里是讲这些故事的好地方。1991 年 2 月 9 日，我在麻省理工学院遇到了一位朋友。他的名字叫 Alfred Weil。他已经攻读博士学位七年了，硕士学位已经结束。
Graduate Student Horror Stories. This is as good a place as any for this. I bumped into a friend at MIT on February 9, 1991. His name will be Alfred Weil. He has been working on his Ph.D. for seven years, beyond his master's degree.
“把盒子的图片放进去。我要你把盒子的图片放进去。”
"Put the picture of the boxes in. I want you to put the picture of the boxes in."
“这些箱子有什么大不了的？”我看着照片中的木箱问道。
"What's the big deal about the boxes?" I asked while I looked at the wooden crates in the photo.
“我建造了它们。它们上面的每个钉子都是我亲手钉上去的。这就是博士的工作吗？让我给你看一看我的一堆图纸。七年来，我建造了这个实验室的每一台设备。我开始工作的时候，这是一个空房间，教授说，‘我们想研究某某对某某的影响。’就是这样。经过七年的工作，终于把东西建好了，我抱怨我没有做足够多的真正的科学研究，那个家伙知道他在地牢里有一个好奴隶，他说，‘你想待多久就待多久。’三年前，我抱怨我所做的只是技术工作，他们说，‘你可以辞职。’他们把你置于一个境地，唯一明智的做法就是辞职。如果你抱怨自己在做毫无意义的苦差事、苦力活，他们就会说你不够好。这并不是说这很难，而是说这不适合攻读博士学位。我认识的另一个人也抱怨过，他的导师对他说：“你是节奏控制者。”就像你是一台机器一样。
"I built them. Every nail in them was hammered in by my hands. Is this the work of a Ph.D.? Let me show you my stack of drawings. Seven years I built every piece of equipment in this laboratory. It was an empty room when I started, and the professor says, 'We would like to study the effect of such and such on such and such.' That was it. Finally the thing is built, after seven years of work, and I complain that I've not done enough real science, and the guy, knowing he has a good slave here in his dungeon says, 'You can stay as long as you want.' Three years ago I complained all I was doing was technician work and they said, 'You can quit.' They put you in a position where the only rational thing to do is to quit. If you complain that you're doing meaningless drudgery, slave labor, they tell you you're not good enough. It wasn't that it was hard, it's that it wasn't appropriate to a Ph.D. effort. Another guy I know complained, and his adviser said to him, 'You're the pacing item.' Like you're a machine.
“看吧，公众对麻省理工学院的看法就像一个峰值探测器。他们只看到诺贝尔奖、来自这里的发现、书籍、产品。但这些都是峰值，高于零。而这里的大多数人却在零以下浪费生命。
"See, the public perception of MIT is like a peak detector. They only see the Nobel prizes, the discoveries coming out of this place, the books, the products. But those are the spikes, here, high above zero. Where most of the people at this place are here wasting their lives below zero.
“这里的研究生教育非常不均衡。这完全取决于你的导师是谁。我认识的一些人，通过资格审查后，从此就一帆风顺了。但其他人……
"It's very non-homogeneous, the graduate education here. It all depends on who your adviser is. Some people I know, after they passed the qualifiers, it was smooth sailing from then on. But others ...
“有个人，他花了三年时间攻读硕士学位，然后通过了资格考试，但他所在部门的最后阶段有将军考试，当了六年奴隶之后，他没有通过将军考试。然后他离开了一年，回来，在向院长请愿后再次参加考试。他们让他通过了，然后他们说，你需要证明你有能力在另一个项目上进行研究。’所以他花了六年时间建立实验，但这一切都泡汤了。就好像他们通过了他，但他们没有让他通过。
"There was one guy, he spent three years on his master's, then he passed the qualifiers, but in his department they have generals at the end, and after six years of being a slave he fails his generals. Then he goes away for a year, comes back, and takes them again, after he petitioned the dean. They let him pass, and then they say, You need to prove your ability to do research on another project.' So the six years he spent building the experiment is shot. It's like they passed him but they didn't pass him.
“还有一名研究生触电身亡，我认识的一名技术员告诉我，这名研究生的导师告诉他，‘你时不时得牺牲一名学生来从事科学研究。’当然，这句话是断章取义的，可能是教授处理自己可能产生的内疚感的方式，但事实就是如此。
"And another graduate student got electrocuted, and this technician I know told me that the guy's adviser told him, 'You have to sacrifice a student to science now and then.' This, of course, was taken out of context, and was probably the professor's way of dealing with any feelings of guilt he might have had, but it was said.
“我总结如下，”阿尔弗雷德继续说道，“他们利用麻省理工学院的声誉吸引才华横溢但容易受骗的人，然后利用他们。”
"I'd sum it up like this," Alfred continued. "They lure talented but gullible people in here with MIT's reputation, and they use them."
阿尔弗雷德的例子也许不具代表性，但是它确实存在。
Alfred's case may not be representative, but it does exist.
泊松分布。泊松分布定义如下：如果平均到达率为 v，则在时间 t 内有 m 个乘客到达的概率为：
Poisson Distribution. A Poisson Distribution is defined as follows: If the average arrival rate is v, the probability of having m arrivals in time t is:
霍华德计算时是 6:55，所以总时间为 15 分钟，到达人数为 9，平均到达率 v 为 9/15，即 0.6。10（t）分钟内总共有 3（m）人到达的概率为：
It was 6:55 when Howard made his calculation, so 15 minutes is the total time, 9 is the total number of arrivals, and v, the average rate of arrival, is 9/15, or 0.6. The probability of a total of 3 (m) people arriving in 10 (t) minutes is:
第十二章
CHAPTER 12
2.70 的历史注释：它是由机械工程系设计小组教授 Woodie Flowers 于 70 年代初期发起的。
An historical note on 2.70: It was started in the early seventies by Woodie Flowers, professor in the design group of the mechanical engineering department.
第十三章
CHAPTER 13
有关史瓦西半径和黑洞的更多信息，请参阅史蒂芬·霍金的《时间简史》（纽约：Bantam，1988 年）。有关相对论中孪生佯谬的更多信息，请参阅 H. Muirhead 的《狭义相对论》（纽约：John Wiley & Sons，1973 年），第 39 页，或 Ray Skinner 的《相对论》（沃尔瑟姆，马萨诸塞州：Blaisdell Publishing，1969 年），第 94 页。
For more about the Schwarzschild radius and black holes, consult A Brief History of Time by Steven Hawking (New York: Bantam, 1988). For more about the twin paradox in relativity, consult The Special Theory of Relativity, by H. Muirhead, (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1973), p. 39, or Relativity, by Ray Skinner, (Waltham, Mass.: Blaisdell Publishing, 1969), p. 94.
第十四章
CHAPTER 14
玩具鸟。这款鸟玩具名为“喝水快乐鸟”，由 ARORA 在台湾 (MIT) 制造。撰写本文时，您可以在波士顿科学博物馆的博物馆商店和儿童故事玩具店 (地址：434 Harvard St., Brookline, MA) 购买 (617-2326182)。
Toy Bird. The bird toy is called the "Drinking Happy Bird," made in Taiwan (MIT) by ARORA. At this writing it is available at the Museum Store of the Boston Museum of Science, and at the Children's Story Toystore, 434 Harvard St., Brookline, MA (617-2326182).
永动机（一般）。如需进一步阅读，请参阅文章：《永动机》，作者：SW Angrist，《科学美国人》（1968 年），218:114-22；以及《大英百科全书》中题为“永动机”的文章。
Perpetual Motion Machines (general). For further reading, consult the article: "Perpetual Motion Machines," by S. W. Angrist, Scientific American (1968), 218:114-22; and the article entitled "Perpetual Motion Machines" in Encyclopaedia Britannica.
摩擦计算。通过了解当维持车轮转动的能源关闭后车轮需要多长时间才能停下来，可以大致计算出保持车轮克服使其停止的摩擦力所需的功率。
Friction Calculation. From a knowledge of how long it takes the wheel to come to a stop once the energy source that keeps it going is off, it is possible to calculate approximately the power required to keep the wheel moving against the friction that makes it stop.
车轮每 4 秒旋转 1 圈。因此，其频率 f 为 0.25 sec，角速度 omega 为：
The wheel rotated at about 1 revolution every 4 seconds. Thus its frequency, f, was 0.25 sect, and its angular velocity, omega, was:
自行车车轮可以看作绕轴旋转的环，其转动惯量（I）简单来说就是：
The bicycle wheel can be considered as a hoop rotating about its axle, and its moment of inertia (I) is simply:
M×R2
M x R2
MX R2，其中 M 是轮辋的质量，R 是车轮的半径。
M X R2, where M is the mass of the rim, and R is the radius of the wheel.
车轮的轮辋质量可能约为 1 公斤。直径为 27 英寸的车轮半径为 13.5 英寸，即 0.343 米。其转动惯量为：
A wheel might have a rim mass of about 1 kg. A 27-inch diameter wheel has a radius of 13.5 inches, or 0.343 meters. Its moment of inertia is then:
车轮大约需要 30 秒才能停下来。通过将车轮运动中存储的能量除以耗散该能量所需的时间，可以估算出维持车轮运转的平均功率。车轮中存储的能量为：
It took about 30 seconds for the wheel to come to a stop. An estimate of the average power to keep it going can be made by dividing the energy stored in the motion of the wheel by the time it takes to dissipate that energy. The energy stored in the wheel was:
正如琼斯博士所说，为了使这个装置运行三周，它需要一个能够储存以下能量的电池：
For the thing to run three weeks, as Dr. Jones claimed, it would need a battery capable of storing:
根据《美国百科全书》，典型的 D 型电池（也称为 Leclanche 干电池）每磅可携带约 0.045 千瓦时。三块 D 型电池重约一磅，因此一块电池可携带约 0.015 千瓦时，因此一块 D 型电池足以为机器供电。
According to Encyclopaedia Americana, a typical D-cell battery (also known as a Leclanche dry cell) carries about 0.045 kilowatthours per pound. Three D-cell batteries weigh about a pound, so one battery should carry about 0.015 kWh, so one D-cell battery would be more than adequate to power the machine.
1791 年，博洛尼亚大学解剖学教授路易吉·伽伐尼（Luigi Galvani，意为“镀锌”、“电流”）偶然将两种不同的金属与一种潮湿的物质接触，从而发现了电池。1800 年，邻近的帕维亚大学自然哲学教授阿莱桑德罗·伏打（Allesandro Volta，意为“电压”）发明了第一块蓄电池，即“伏打电堆”。伏打教授在科莫度过了很长一段时间，科莫是阿尔卑斯山脚下科莫湖畔的一座美丽小镇。
The battery was discovered by Luigi Galvani (as in galvanize, galvanic action), professor of anatomy at the University of Bologna, in 1791, when he accidentally brought two dissimilar metals into contact with a moist substance. Allesandro Volta (as in voltage), professor of natural philosophy at the neighboring University of Pavia, developed the first storage battery, the "voltaic pile," in 1800. Professor Volta spent much time in Como, the lovely town on Lake Como, in the foothills of the Alps.
有关旋转系统的系统动力学的更多信息，请参阅 Shearer、Murphy 和 Richardson 编写的《系统动力学导论》（马萨诸塞州雷丁：Addison-Wesley，1971 年）。
For more on system dynamics of rotational systems, consult Introduction to System Dynamics, by Shearer, Murphy and Richardson (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1971).
车轮上的风力。如果铜管中有空气通过，沿着轮辋侧面剪切，功率就会传递到轮辋，如下计算。
Wind Force on Wheel. If the copper tubes had air going through them, to shear along the side of the rim, power would be delivered to the rim, as calculated below.
或总共约 2 x 10-4 瓦。我们刚刚计算的摩擦功率约为 0.005 瓦，因此喷气机无法提供足够的功率来克服摩擦。如果有喷气机，它们就不会转动车轮。
or about 2 x 10-4 watts in total. The friction power we just calculated above as about 0.005 watts, so the jets would not be able to deliver enough power to overcome the friction. If there were jets, they wouldn't turn the wheel.
移动板电容器。有关这些内容的讨论，请参阅《机械和机电系统动力学》，作者：Crandall、Karnopp、Kurtz 和 Pridmore-Brown（佛罗里达州马拉巴尔：Krieger Publishing [原为 McGraw-Hill，1968 年]），第 6 章。
Moving Plate Capacitors. For a discussion of these, consult Dynamics of Mechanical and Electromechanical Systems, by Crandall, Karnopp, Kurtz, and Pridmore-Brown (Malabar, Fla.: Krieger Publishing [originally McGraw-Hill, 1968]), Ch. 6.
电机原理。有关电动机工作原理的更多信息，请参阅《事物运作的方式》，第 300-301 页。
Motor principle. For more on how electric motors work, consult The Way Things Work, pp. 300-301.
第十五章
CHAPTER 15
黑客（一般）。有关此主题的更多信息，请参阅 Brian Liebowitz 所著的《黑客、愚蠢行为和恶作剧研究所期刊》（马萨诸塞州剑桥：麻省理工学院博物馆，1990 年）。活牛的故事可能是杜撰的。
Hacking (general). For more on this subject, see The Journal of the Institute for Hacks, TomFoolery and Pranks, by Brian Liebowitz (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Museum, 1990). The live cow story may be apocryphal.
共振频率。有关这方面的更多信息，请参阅 Shearer、Murphy 和 Richardson 的《系统动力学导论》或任何基础物理教科书。在 Halliday 和 Resnick 的《物理学基础》中，共振的定义如下：“当一个能够振荡的系统受到一系列周期性脉冲的作用时，这些脉冲的频率等于或接近于该系统的自然振荡频率之一，系统就会以相对较大的振幅振荡。”这种情况偶尔会发生在桥梁上，有一个著名的电影片段，塔科马海峡（华盛顿州）大桥因风引起的振荡而产生共振并最终倒塌。
Resonant Frequency. For more about this, consult Shearer, Murphy, and Richardson, Introduction to System Dynamics, or any elementary physics textbook. In Halliday and Resnick, Fundamentals of Physics, resonance is defined as follows: "Whenever a system capable of oscillating is acted on by a periodic series of impulses having a frequency equal or nearly equal to one of the natural frequencies of oscillation of the system, the system is set into oscillation with a relatively large amplitude." This has happened with bridges occasionally, and there is a famous film clip of the Takoma Narrows (Washington state) bridge resonating and ultimately collapsing as a result of wind-induced oscillations.
“共鸣”这个词语也被文学界盗用，指的是当书中的所有内容汇聚在一起，你终于明白作者想要表达的意思时，那种起鸡皮疙瘩的感觉。
The term resonance has also been stolen by the literary community, as that feeling of goose bumps when everything in the book comes together and you finally figure out what the author is trying to say.
第十六章
CHAPTER 16
有关频闪灯的更多信息及其使用方法，请参阅 Harold E. Edgerton 著《电子闪光灯、频闪灯》（马萨诸塞州剑桥：麻省理工学院出版社，1979 年）第 2 版。
For more on the strobe light and how to use it, consult Electronic Flash, Strobe, by Harold E. Edgerton (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1979), 2nd ed.
第二件有趣的事情。1983 年春天，我和以色列军官安一起参加了机械工程系的一次公开会议。罗森诺教授主持了会议，会议的主题是政府如何削减研究经费。
Second Amusing Anecdote. An, the Israeli army officer, and I attended an open mechanical engineering department meeting in the spring of 1983. Professor Rohsenow conducted the meeting, and the topic steered toward how the government was cutting back on research funding.
罗森诺说：“好吧，如果你认为私营企业会用它们未向政府缴纳的税款来弥补不足，那么我们就应该没事。”
Rohsenow said, "Well, if you assume that private industry will take up the slack with the money that they don't pay the government in taxes, we should be fine."
韦尔教授问道：“对不起，您怎么能做出这样的假设呢？”
Professor Weare asked, "Excuse me, but how can you make that assumption?"
“我是共和党人，”罗森诺回答道。
"I'm a Republican," Rohsenow answered.
第十七章
CHAPTER 17
有关 LISP 的更多信息，请参阅 Abelson 和 Sussman 合著的《计算机程序结构和解释》（McGraw-Hill and MIT Press，1985 年）和 Patrick H. Winston、Berthold Klaus 和 Paul Horn 合著的《LISP》（Reading，Mass.：Addison-Wesley，1981 年）。有关人工智能的阅读材料，请参阅 Patrick Winston 合著的《人工智能》（Addison-Wesley，1984 年）。此外，Douglas R. Hofstadter 合著的《Godel, Escher, Bach》（New York：Vintage Books，1989 年）也应该非常不错，尽管我还没有读过。但这并不意味着我读过本文中提到的任何其他书籍。自行车。如果您曾经到过比利时迪南（顺便说一下，这里是萨克斯管发明者阿道夫·萨克斯的出生地）附近，请前往法尔米诺尔村的 Musr a de la Petite Reine。无论如何，它 1980 年就在那里。您可能想提前打电话（比利时：082-74.44.05）或写信。他们有 19 世纪发明的多种不同类型自行车的样品。地址是：Musee de la Petite Reine；法尔米诺尔，那慕尔省；比利时。该博物馆由 Ernest Wouters 先生创建。
For more on LISP, consult Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs, by Abelson and Sussman (McGraw-Hill and MIT Press, 1985), and LISP, by Patrick H. Winston, Berthold Klaus, and Paul Horn (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1981). For reading on artificial intelligence, consult Artificial Intelligence, by Patrick Winston (Addison-Wesley, 1984). Also Godel, Escher, Bach, by Douglas R. Hofstadter (New York: Vintage Books, 1989), is supposed to be really good along these lines, although I haven't read it. Which is not to imply that I've read any of the other books referred to herein. Bicycles. If you're ever near Dinant, Belgium (incidentally the birthplace of Adolph Sax, inventor of the saxophone), go to Musr a de la Petite Reine, in the village of Falmignoul. It was there in 1980, anyway. You might want to call ahead (Belgium: 082-74.44.05) or write. They have samples of the many different types of bicycles invented during the nineteenth century. The address is: Musee de la Petite Reine; Falmignoul, Province de Namur; Belgium. The museum was created by Mr. Ernest Wouters.
第十八章
CHAPTER 18
请注意，本章中介绍的论文结果旨在说明分析和讨论实验数据的过程。我所做的工作为 E. Balles 和 M. Theobald 后来的工作提供了参考。可以通过参考 JB Heywood 教授发表的汽车工程师学会论文找到这项工作。
Please note, the thesis results presented in this chapter are meant to illustrate the process of analyzing and discussing experimental data. The work I did fed into later work by E. Balles and M. Theobald. That work may be located by referencing Society of Automotive Engineers papers published by Professor J. B. Heywood.
哈佛大桥。麻省理工学院博物馆商店有关于此桥的档案。这座桥之所以不叫科技大桥，是因为在 19 世纪末建成时，麻省理工学院还在波士顿。严格地说，这座桥是以约翰·哈佛而不是哈佛学院的名字命名的，而且由于这座桥在历史上的不同时期都出现过结构问题，最终在 1980 年代末被替换，麻省理工学院并不急于将这座桥改名为科技大桥。
The Harvard Bridge. The MIT Museum Shop has a file on this. It's not called the Technology Bridge because when it was built in the late 1800s, MIT was still in Boston. Technically it was named after John Harvard, not Harvard College, and since it had structural problems at various points in its history, culminating in its replacement in the late 1980s, MIT was not all that eager to have the bridge's name changed to the Technology Bridge.
惠斯通电桥。有关其工作原理的详细信息，请参阅 Kirk 和 Rimboi 编写的仪器（伊利诺伊州阿尔西普：美国技术出版社，1975 年），第 117 页。
Wheatstone Bridge. For more detail on how these work, see instrumentation by Kirk and Rimboi (Alsip, Ill.: American Technical Publishers, 1975), p. 117.
在热线电路中，电阻不平衡会导致电桥两点之间出现电压差。然后，该电压差进入放大器，使整个电桥上的电压上升或下降，以保持热线风速计处于恒定温度，从而保持恒定电阻。因此，如果流速减慢，热线会变得更热，放大的电压会下降。相反，如果流速加快，电线会冷却，电压会迅速上升以保持电线的温度。放大的电压就是您在示波器屏幕上看到的电压。感谢 Alfred Weil 纠正了我的解释。火花塞。请参阅《事物的运作方式》，第 308-309 页。另请参阅《内燃机》，作者 Edward F. Obert（宾夕法尼亚州斯克兰顿：国际教科书，1968 年），第 532 页及后续页。该图来自该书。
In a hot-wire circuit, the imbalance in resistances causes a voltage difference between two points of the bridge. That voltage difference then goes into an amplifier, which makes the voltage across the total bridge go up or down, to maintain the hot-wire anemometer at a constant temperature, and hence a constant resistance. So if the flow slows down, the hot wire gets hotter, and the amplified voltage goes down. Conversely, if the flow speeds up, the wire cools and the voltage quickly goes up to keep the wire hot. The amplified voltage is what you read on the oscilloscope screen. Thanks to Alfred Weil for correcting my explanation. Spark Plug. See The Way Things Work, pp. 308-309. Also see Internal Combustion Engines, by Edward F. Obert (Scranton, Pa.: International Textbook, 1968), p. 532ff. The diagram is from that book.
第十九章
CHAPTER 19
见诗篇第 91 篇。
See Psalm 91.
第二十章
CHAPTER 20
最终报价：
Final quotation:
让知识不断增长。但我们心中的敬畏之心却越来越强烈。心灵和灵魂，可以像以前一样创造出音乐，但更加广阔。
Let knowledge grow from more to more. But more of reverence in us dwell. That mind and soul, according well May make one music as before But vaster.
-摘自阿尔弗雷德·丁尼生勋爵的《悼念》
-From in Memoriam, by Alfred Lord Tennyson
指数
Index
